PESHAWAR: Growing or grafting olive plants in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, especially in Malakand Division, is yet to get the government attention despite the fact the area is already rich in species and has great potential for growing the plants for oil production.
About a decade ago, the initiative of grafting wild olive trees was taken from Malakand top where hundreds of old trees were grafted with oil producing species that proved successful.
Following this initiative, local youth from Talash area of Lower Dir district, while learning grafting technique from an Italian national, started grafting wild olive.
They have so far grafted about 114,000 trees in the valley wherein 22,000 of them have started production.
According to an expert from Karachi, Dr Fayaz Alam, general secretary, Dua Foundation, one tree produces from 10 to 150 kilograms of fruit.
If promoted, the government can save billions of rupees being spent on cooking oil import as
the country is receiving from abroad 84 percent of total consumption of this oil.
He says the minimum price of the olive fruit is Rs 300 per kg and a grower having 500 trees can earn at least 1.5 million rupees a year.
According to him, only the mountains of the Talash Valley has hundreds of thousands of wild olive trees.
Almost all districts of the Malakand Division have a large number of wild olive trees which, if grafted on the commercial level, can bring about economic revolution besides earning billions of rupees annually for the country.
But unfortunately, the government forest or agriculture departments are yet to take serious steps for growing and grafting of olive plants.
Even in the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) flagship Billion Trees Tsunami Project attention was not given to the olive trees plantation.
The government seriousness can be judged from the fact that this scribe during an informal chat at a function at the Governor’s House had suggested to the Chief Minister Mahmood Khan to plant olive trees along the Swat Expressway as a pilot project as the highway being fenced is suitable for olive plants.
Although the chief minister had agreed, in principle, to the suggestion but even after one and a half years, no practical steps were taken for plantation alongside the Expressway which is not only safe from animal or human damage but also environmentally feasible for growing olive plants.
A few days ago, the Jamaat-e-Islami ameer Senator Sirajul Haq also demanded the government declare Malakand Division Zaitoon Valley and start wild olive grafting in the region on a massive scale.
Addressing a function he said, the region has wild olive trees in abundance and if promoted on a commercial level and oil extracting machinery installed at the local level, olive oil production would not only change the fate of local growers but also would earn billions of foreign exchange for the country.
The JI Members Provincial Assembly (MPAs) Inayatullah Khan, Sirajuddin and Sumera Khatoon have submitted a joint resolution in the KP Assembly demanding promotion of olive tree grafting in the province.
Now is the time for the government to give serious attention to the planting and grafting of olive trees which can bring about prosperity to the growers as well as contribute to the national exchequer.