05/13/04 - Dara Masih picks a can of ghee - clarified butter used forcooking - from a shop in one of Lahore's poorest districts as he lamentsthe higher cost of healthier vegetable cooking oil, which is out of reachfor Pakistan's lower-income families.

In a year when many analysts are predicting a rise in production ofoilseeds across Pakistan, Mr Masih sees few signs of people switching overto vegetable oil.

"You tell me there are more oilseeds being produced in Pakistan. Thatought to make it much cheaper to consume oil for cooking," said the fatherof seven who works as a hotel janitor. The truth is, cooking oil is noless expensive today than a year ago."

As analysts predict a rise of up to 14 per cent in the country's oilseedsproduction this year, many Pakistanis, including Mr Masih, remainunconvinced.

Their failure to be impressed by the upturn in production reflects poorlyon the ambition of successive governments to achieve self-sufficiency forthe world's third-largest importer of edible oil for a population of atleast 145m.

Edible oil imports have traditionally represented Pakistan'ssecond-largest import expenditure after petroleum products for energy use.In the past, oilseed production has been highlighted by governments as animportant way to save foreign exchange. But attempts to increaseproduction have not been successful for a variety of reasons.

Ameer Mohammad, former chairman of the Pakistan Agricultural ResearchCouncil, says that even if production rises this year there is still notenough evidence that this will be sustainable.

"There are several issues for farmers who sow crops to extract cookingoil," says Mr Mohammad. "The main problem for such crops is that they aresusceptible to damage by birds or rodents."

Officials at the agriculture ministry in Islamabad acknowledge thatoilseeds suffer from a number of chronic challenges facing Pakistan's cropproduction, such as the adulteration of pesticides and chemicalfertilisers, and a failure to deliver high quality seeds to farmers.

Many farmers also lament the failure of governments to develop newmarketing outlets to end the prevailing system, where middle men workingon commissions take a considerable portion of farm incomes.

The failure to encourage farmers to grow alternative crops is partly theresult of the government's inability to launch a widespread educationalcampaign.

"For almost 20 years now, we have talked about the need to have ourfarmers grow more oilseeds," says an agriculture ministry official. "Butfarmers still ask fundamental questions such as 'are oilseeds any betterfor us than traditional crops?'."

But there are factors in favour of higher production.

"Across Pakistan's farmlands, there is a lot of evidence of a larger areacoming under oilseed crops this year," says Naveed Qamar, a former financeminister and member of parliament. "Farmers have been driven to oilseedsmainly for economic reasons."

Mr Qamar says a shortage of irrigation water in parts of Pakistan hasforced farmers to grow crops, such as sunflowers, that consume less waterthan crops such as sugar cane.

"The shortage of irrigation water has set a good part of the emergingtrend and forced farmers to consider oilseeds," he says.

But Mr Qamar warns that Pakistan faces an uphill struggle in asking morefarmers to grow oilseeds, despite their significance for domesticconsumption. The government's support mechanisms for oilseeds, like othercrops, remain inadequate, he notes.

"This year too, we have encouraged farmers to grow more oilseeds. But isanyone thinking about a rapid expansion of facilities for extractingoilseeds to make edible oil?" asks Mr Qamar. "The next crisis could be anabundance of oilseeds but not enough production facilities."