MULTAN: A severe attack of mealybug is being witnessed on cotton crop in south Punjab districts.In the wake of the attack, the Punjab Agriculture Department has warned the cotton growers to adopt measures to offset the attack. The Punjab Agriculture Department has assessed that mealybug has attacked almost 60pc cotton crop in all 11 districts of the south Punjab.Mealybug infestations appear on plants as tiny, soft-bodied insects surrounded by a fuzzy, white mess around the stems and leaf nodes. Mealybugs are common indoor pests. Mealybugs are related to scale insects.They cause damage by sucking the juice from their host plants. Cotton Mealybug is an exotic pest of several crops, including maize, okra, brinjals, potato, sorghum, ground nuts, pigeon peas, sunflower, beat root, mulberry and especially cotton, agriculture officials maintained.Pakistan stands at fourth position among 60 cotton growing countries of the world and third largest consumer of the cotton. Cotton as a major crop of Pakistan contributes 7.8pc in value addition in agriculture, 1.6pc in gross domestic product making upto 60pc of the total export revenue and 55pc of Pakistan’s domestic cooking oil comes from cottonseeds. Punjab Agriculture Information spokesperson Naveed Asmat Kahloon said that field teams had observed mealybug attack in majority areas under cotton sowing.
from The News International - National https://ift.tt/2ZHbBaf
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