The government will impart training to 100 farmers to cultivate olives on a vast tract of land in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, WealthPK reports.

Under the five-year olive cultivation project, initiated in the tribal districts of the province,

1.5 million wild olives will be grafted with the help of agricultural experts and trained farmers. Olives will be planted on 15,000 hectares piece of land in the newly-merged tribal districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under the project.

An official of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Agriculture Department told WealthPK that 100 farmers would be trained in olives cultivation. He said that purification units would be set up in the olive-producing areas to extract oil from the produce of the trees planted and grated under the project.

He said that the climate and fertile soil of the tribal areas of the province are suitable for olive cultivation. He said that the government launched the five-year project to tap the potential of those areas to make Pakistan self-sufficient in edible oil.

The official said that the Suleiman Mountain, Malakand division and tribal districts are the most suitable areas for olive cultivation. He added that olives could be grown on 700,000 hectares of land in those areas on commercial bases.

He said that different projects were launched in the country including Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to grow olives. The first project, funded by the government of Italy, to promote cultivation of olives was initiated on June 1, 2012, in the country. It was handed over to Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC), Islamabad after the devolution of the Pakistan Oil Development Board (PODB) on February 12, 2012, following the passage of the 18^th Amendment. The project was completed on June 30, 2015.

He said that the federal government launched a project entitled “Promotion of Olive Trees Cultivation on Commercial Scale” in 2015. “Eight certification laboratories will be also established while an olive company will be set up to ensure stability in the prices of olive oil,” he told WealthPK.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan-WealthPak