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LAHORE: Deploying artificial intelligence and modern technology is no longer optional but essential for overcoming Pakistan’s intensifying agricultural challenges, said Zeeshan Baig, CEO of Syngenta Pakistan and the youngest-ever chairperson of CropLife Pakistan on Thursday.
Dubbing his vision as ‘The Moment That Matters’, which positions farmers as central stakeholders in a comprehensive national undertaking to fortify food security and establish resilience, Zeeshan Baig, shared the narrative of Shakeel, a farmer from remote Sindh who previously required extended periods to secure expert consultation and currently obtains rapid crop diagnostics through innovative digital mechanisms.
This farmer-centred perspective illustrates the scale of the crisis: agriculture contributes 23.44 per cent of GDP, yet five principal crops have grown by merely 0.65 per cent, 24 per cent of Pakistanis face food insecurity, per capita water availability has fallen by 80 per cent since 1964, and soil health is under escalating strain. The 2022 floods alone caused $12.9 billion in agricultural losses, with climate change making such disruptions increasingly frequent, observed.
Rather than waiting for a single transformative discovery, Baig champions modest, validated technological improvements that deliver substantial results. These include AI-informed sowing advisories that raised yields by 30 per cent in India, precision spraying systems that cut herbicide use by 59 per cent in the United States, and laser land levelling in Punjab that reduced water consumption by 20-30 per cent while boosting yields by approximately 10 per cent. The same intervention demonstrates that producing more food does not require consuming more of Pakistan’s scarce resources; better land preparation and informed farm management can raise output while reducing avoidable losses.
Speaking at the PAC conference, Baig urged a decisive shift towards irrigation efficiency. He noted that Pakistan’s agricultural system remains heavily dependent on irrigation while water availability has declined sharply over recent decades. “Until these small things or small decisions are not solved, until we don’t empower farmers to make the right decisions, we will never be able to solve food security in Pakistan,” he said. The significance is particularly acute for Punjab, which accounts for a major share of national agricultural output, meaning provincial efficiency gains could shape national food supplies.
Baig stressed that farmers must receive the right information and practical support at the moment field decisions are made, including weather data, agronomic advisory and crop requirements. Technology, he emphasised, should complement rather than replace farmers’ experience, with solutions designed around practical needs rather than sophistication alone.
Syngenta’s existing platforms already reach over seven million acres, with the Cropwise Grower app recording more than 1.7 million downloads and the Savera AI agronomist operating in Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashto and Siraiki. Biological products such as Quantis and Isabion are being deployed to improve soil health. The company estimates that every 20 per cent growth in its business adds 0.5 per cent to GDP, impacting over one million households annually, while $12 billion a year is needed in irrigation and innovation to raise cereal yields by 72 per cent by 2050.
Success, Baig concluded, requires farmers working alongside government, finance, research and the private sector. For Pakistan, the shift towards smarter irrigation is ultimately about water productivity rather than water consumption, producing more food from the same, or potentially smaller, volume of increasingly scarce water.
As agricultural demand continues to rise, improving efficiency at farm level could help protect crop output while reducing pressure on one of the country’s most constrained natural resources.
