By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)
(Pakistan News & Features Services)
The Sindh Senior Education Minister Nisar Ahmed Khuhro, has mentioned
that Sindh exports its mangos to 45 countries of the world and earns
huge revenue of Rs 39 billion in foreign exchange.
He was addressing at Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Exhibition Hall following
the inauguration of 50th Golden Jubilee Mango Festival in Mirpurkhas. He
said that more than 76 farmers have introduced different varieties of
mangos in this festival.
He stressed on improvement of quality of mangos and its packing in order
to maintain export in 45 countries and for that purpose private sector
has also play its part side by side with government.
The Deputy Commissioner, Rasheed Ahmed Zardari, and the Chairman, Mango
Festival Management Committee, Umer Bughio, said that the celebration of
Golden Jubilee Festival was an honour for the people of Mirpurkhas.
They said that the mangos of Mirpurkhas have special identity worldwide,
recognizing that the role of district administration, Mango Festival
Management Committee and the media remained important.
Later talking to media Nisar Khuhro said that the Mango Festival was not
only limited to Mirpurkhas but it highlighted the whole of the Sindh
province. He urged the media to project the festival in a positive style
to let the product could fetch more foreign markets.
To a question Nisar Khuhro said that mangos of Mirpurkhas remained in
demand all over the world and it was a praiseworthy effort to have
organized the Mango exhibition annually for 50 years.
He said that the varieties exhibited in last exhibition were 83 in
number, which have increased to 183 during the Golden Jubilee occasion.
He was of the opinion that further research was required for the
production of more varieties, praising the Sindh Horticulture Research
Institute Mirpurkhas for doing a fine job.
Replying to another question, Nisar Khuhro said that paucity of
irrigation water and farm diseases have caused damages to some extent to
mango farms and for that reason the Sindh Government was introducing
reforms in agriculture department to protect mangos and other crops from
diseases.
He later visited in detail different stalls of mangos. He also performed
the opening of Family Festival at Police ground and visited stalls.
MPA Khairun Nissa Mughal, former MPA Shamim Ara Panhwar, DIG Javed Alam
Odho, SSP Usman Ghani Siddiqui, DC Rasheed Ahmed Zardari, AC-2 Nisar
Ahmed Memon, Chairman Festival Committee Umer Bughio, Director
Horticulture Ashraf Soomro, Director Primary Education Jalil Lashari and
others were also present on the occasion.