Cotton Economy in Pakistan May Lose $117 Million From Floods, FCStone Says

[British_Bangladeshi]

The cotton industry in Pakistan, the world’s fourth-biggest grower, may lose as much as 10 billion rupees ($117 million) this season after the worst floods in eight decades, according to FCStone Group Inc.

“Rough estimates are circulating that the local cotton economy, including fiber, cottonseed, edible oil and all by- products, will suffer a loss this season of up to 10 billion rupees,” FCStone said in a report dated yesterday. “Swollen rivers threaten the heavily-irrigated domestic crop, but the exact degree of damage” is difficult to assess, it said.

The flooding has become “Pakistan’s worst national rice disaster,” Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said yesterday. The waters have destroyed 30 percent of the nation’s cotton crop and may spur more imports, trade group the Kissan Board of Pakistan said yesterday.

The rains and flooding are “crimping prospects for a bumper cotton crop this year, helping drive local prices higher and suggesting cotton yarn prices may not decline much in the near term,” FCStone wrote in the report. “Traders are taking no chances and are actively buying the rumor.”

Cotton in New York was little changed at 80.34 cents a pound in after-hours electronic trading at 1:17 p.m. in Singapore. Futures advanced for a third day yesterday as flooding reduces production in Pakistan.

China is the world’s top cotton grower, followed by India, the U.S. and Pakistan, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

source of information:http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-...ose-117-million-from-floods-fcstone-says.html

 

[British_Bangladeshi]

Floods cause ‘major harm’ to Pakistan’s economy: IMF

ISLAMABAD: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Tuesday that the floods will cause “major harm to the economy” of Pakistan as donors and investors’ concerns are growing over the disaster’s impact on an already fragile economy.

According to a report by a private TV channel, an IMF spokesman said that the floods “are very likely to cause major harm to the economy in terms of loss of output and budgetary consequences...” The spokesman said IMF officials were in touch with the authorities to assess the situation, APP reported.

Separately, Reuters reported a Finance Ministry official as saying that economic growth target of 4.5 percent for fiscal year 2010-2011 would have to be revised downwards once the extent of the damage caused by floods is known. agencies

source of information:Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan

---------- Post added at 02:32 AM ---------- Previous post was at 02:31 AM ----------

These floods are doing really bad for the pakistani economy, hope all goes well for pakistan.