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Although the System of Rice Intensification (SRI) began later in Pakistan than in the rest of South Asia, it is now getting a good start with the involvement of the On-Farm Water Management wing (OFWM) of the Punjab State Department of Agriculture and at the Agricultural University at Faisalabad (UAF).

Progress and Activities

2007
During a visit to Cornell University in September 2007, Mushtaq Gill, Director General for Agriculture (Water Management) in Punjab, Pakistan, gave a presentation entitled "Increasing Water Productivity of Rice through Adoption of System of Rice Intensification (SRI)" to CIIFAD's SRI Group. The presentation noted SRI seminars at University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF) and in Okara Project area in Pakstan as well as the results of SRI trials at UAF. Participating farmers and area with SRI trials doubled during 2007.

2006
As observed by Norman Uphoff during a October 2006 visit (see trip report), on-farm trials in Okara District south of Lahore have an increment to yield of 30-45%, also with basmati varieties. Water use has been reduced by about one-third, and seed requirements by much more than that. Farmers expressed satisfaction with the new methods, partly because SRI rice plants have shown themselves to be much more resistant to lodging, seen after a recent severe storm at the end of the growing season.

Yield was expected to be as good as or higher than that on the control plots with conventional practices while using 2/3 less water and 2/3 less seed. This is good and important news for Pakistani farmers as water becomes increasingly scarce. Some SRI plots that had gone without water for as much as 22 days were nevertheless growing well, attributable to their superior growth of root systems.

2005
During 2005, Pakistan became the 22nd country from which we have evidence that SRI methods provide multiple benefits. The ICIMOD Newsletter (no. 46) from the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development, based in Kathmandu, reports on its introduction of SRI last year into Hilkot village, Mansehra District, in the Northwest Frontier Province, where its staff have been working with villagers since 1999. The newsletter notes that "the innovative SRI technique of transplanting single, very young seedlings at wide planting intervals - as opposed to the traditional more mature bunches of seedlings at a closer interval - has results in a 50% yield increase. The skeptical farmers who transplanted the rice found these results unbelievable."

During a visit to Sri Lanka during September 2005, Dr. Mushtaq Gill, director-general for on-farm water management in the Department of Agriculture for Punjab Province, visited some farms using SRI practices. Upon his return to Lahore, he initiated a number of SRI trials and field demonstrations. Punjab Province is the country’s major rice-growing region, especially for prized basmati rice, which is a major source of national export earnings.

Several Pakistani NGOs had inquired about SRI over the as early as 2001. The National Rural Development Support Programme learned about SRI at an Asian Productivity Organization seminar in Tokyo in 2003 and indicated an intention to introduce SRI in its anti-poverty efforts.

Reports and Presentations

• Uphoff, N.T. (2006) Report on a visit to Pakistan to review progress with SRI: October 17-21, 2006. Cornell International Institute for Food, Agric. and Devel. 9.p (203 KB pdf)


• Gill, Mushtaq. (2007, Sept. 25). Increasing Water Productivity of Rice through Adoption of System of Rice Intensification (SRI), a presentation given to the SRI group at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, by the Director General for Agriculture (Water Management) in Punjab, Pakistan. (2.38 MB pdf)


• Farooq, M., Basra, S. M. A., & Saleem, B. A. (2006, Sept. 4). System of rice intensification: a beneficial option. Dawn (online edition).