Govt to digitise farmers, agricultural land records

According to the Prime Minister's Office, the government proposed on Friday a digital database covering farmers and farmland, along with information on soil and water tests. The proposal, Digital Farmers' Diary-AgriStack, was put before a meeting that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif chaired in Islamabad, which centred on farm output and agricultural exports. The same meeting also floated the Pakistan-Good Agriculture Practices (Pak-GAP) framework, intended to encourage methods that deliver stronger harvests.

Pakistan's agricultural exports reached $5.18 billion in the previous financial year, officials told the meeting. Leading shipments included maize, mangoes, tobacco, sesame, potatoes, halal meat, fisheries and rice. China, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Gulf countries were named as important markets, and the prime minister told trade officers at overseas missions to push exports. He also ordered a publicity drive promoting a crop-tracking app on mobile phones.

Lending to farmers stood at Rs1.268 trillion as of August 2026, and the target is Rs2 trillion by June 2028 under the Access to Finance Plan 2026-28. Officials also said the Zarkhez-e app had drawn 35,838 loan applications, and that Rs7.35 billion had been signed off while Rs1.96 billion was released. The prime minister had earlier asked banks to lend more to farmers, calling agriculture the backbone of the economy.