Around a decade ago, Abdul Rehman Arain, a small farmer from Matiari, grew wheat for income generation in the Rabi season for the last time. Since then, he prefers mustard cultivation, an oilseed crop, on his seven acres of land, as he finds it easier to grow than wheat.

“Now I grow wheat only for the household’s flour requirements. Mustard is easy to handle and offers better returns than grain,” he shared. For him, mustard isn’t as high maintenance as wheat and “doesn’t require heavy inputs either”.

He felt that getting an adequate price for wheat has become increasingly difficult nowadays, whereas mustard, with lesser input costs, ensures either equal or impressive returns. He got a price of Rs7,000 per 40kg for mustard and had around 40–45 maunds per acre two years back. Only last year, he sold 40kg of mustard for Rs4,000–4,500 — a time when grain was sold for Rs2,200 per 40kg in the absence of support prices. This year, the government has announced a Rs3,500 support price for wheat.

The mustard crop is grown on a considerable scale in the lower Sindh region. Travelling from Hyderabad or Karachi towards upper Sindh, one can find large mustard fields with their bright golden flowers in full bloom, an eye-catching landscape indeed. It is among the principal sources of edible oil and a winter parallel crop to sunflowers for farmers.

Despite a lack of financial support, mustard has shown great potential for import substitution as an easier and cheaper-to-produce crop

Its cultivation costs around Rs20,000–25,000 per acre, including two urea bags along with seed, when compared with the Rs80,000 per acre or so expense of sowing wheat, according to Mr Arain. You could grow mustard even in October — much before the winter season actually begins — and harvest it in 60–90 days.

Punjab’s farmers also grow short-duration mustard on a large scale, alongside oilseed crops such as maize and canola. Whilst Mr Arain remained comfortable with mustard’s cultivation, Pakistan’s reliance on edible oil imports remains endless. Pakistan spends considerable foreign exchange on edible oil imports, as the potential of oilseed crops seems not to have been fully tapped.

The Economic Survey of Pakistan (ESP) FY25 projected total edible oil availability at 3.07 million tonnes — with the actual figure likely much higher — ensuring a stable supply for domestic consumption.

This included 2.58m tonnes of imports valued at Rs764.9 billion ($2.75bn), of which 148,000 tonnes were extracted from imported oilseeds (at the cost of precious foreign exchange spending). Encouragingly, it said, local edible oil production was estimated to reach 486,000 tonnes, showing modest growth driven by an expansion in oilseed cultivation and yield improvements in certain oilseed crops.

ESP figures indicated a Pakistan-wide total of 7.01m acres under oilseed crops in FY24, with a production of 466,000 tonnes. In FY25, oilseed crop acreage was 6.33m, with production of 486,000 tonnes.

A review of FY23 and FY24 statistics showed variation, with total acreage for all oilseed crops at 7.04m acres and 504,000 tonnes of production in FY23, compared with 6.96m acres and 471,000 tonnes of production in FY24.

Data from the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, according to a national food security ministry official, highlights Pakistan’s unending reliance on imports, with almost 90 per cent of oil demand met by foreign sources. PBS figures indicated that during FY25, the national edible oil requirement stood at 4.64m tonnes, with 4.17m tonnes (90pc) being met from imports and only a paltry 0.47m tonnes through local production.

Of imported oil, 3.2m tonnes came from palm oil, 320,000 tonnes from soybean and 80,000 tonnes of other oils in addition to oil extraction from imported oilseeds of soybean (1.52m tonnes), canola/rapeseed (610,000 tonnes) and sunflower seed (29,000 tonnes). Their respective oil production stood at 274,000 tonnes, 256,000 tonnes, and 12,000 tonnes to make a total availability of edible oils from imported sources of 4.17m tonnes.

Experts like Iqrar A Khan, former vice chancellor of the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, believed that the mustard crop’s potential was not being realised. Mustard competes with wheat — a protected crop, he explained. “Mustard doesn’t enjoy this privilege and faces an inherent disadvantage. Still, it has got potential for import substitution for edible oil.”

Mr Khan said mustard fared better last year after the government’s abrupt deregulation of the wheat crop. Similarly, he said, soybeans, as an oilseed crop, were being imported, probably as affordable, high-quality poultry feed. But it could be grown here in Kharif to compete with the water-guzzling paddy crop, thereby saving precious water resources.

An official of the Ministry of National Food Security & Research believed, according to PBS figures, that 3.63m tonnes of edible oil worth $3.85bn were imported to meet domestic needs. “India is achieving 13m tonnes of rapeseed/mustard crop locally, while we are getting a negligible quantum of it, although mustard cultivation can easily be increased up to 1–1.5m tonnes,” he said.

He disclosed that India produces 43pc of its total edible oil requirement domestically, against Pakistan’s 10pc local production of total needs.

To boost Pakistan’s oilseed sector, the Pakistan Oilseed Development Board (PODB) was established in 1994. PODB performed satisfactorily to some extent. Sunflower’s growth in Sindh under its umbrella over a decade ago was attributed to it. After a constitutional amendment, PODB was wound up as agriculture was devolved to provinces.

Former PODB managing director Ghulam Idris Khan has mentioned a considerable decline, in his recent writing, in local edible oil production — from 30pc to 10pc of total national consumption. According to him, despite directives from the prime minister’s office for a strategic development plan on edible oil production, the ministry struggled to take any coherent action. He calls for reviving this key sector of the national economy to secure food security.

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, December 8th, 2025