The government on Friday proposed a nationwide digital system to maintain farmers’ and agricultural land records, including soil and water testing data, as part of efforts to modernise Pakistan’s agriculture sector, according to the Prime Minister’s Office. The Digital Farmers’ Diary-AgriStack proposal was presented at a high-level meeting chaired by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in Islamabad focused on the development of agriculture and the promotion of agricultural exports. Under the proposed system, records of farmers and agricultural land across the country would be digitised, along with information related to soil and water testing, giving the government a more centralised and structured view of a sector that has historically relied on fragmented, paper based record keeping across provinces. The meeting also proposed introducing the Pakistan-Good Agriculture Practices (Pak-GAP) system, intended to promote agricultural practices that produce better yields and outcomes for farmers across the country.
The prime minister said increasing per acre yields, modernising agriculture, developing the livestock sector, and expanding agricultural exports required effective coordination and partnership between the federal and provincial governments, framing the digitisation push as one piece of a broader reform agenda rather than a standalone initiative. “Value addition in agricultural products is essential to increase exports from the agricultural sector,” Shehbaz said, directing commercial officers at Pakistan’s overseas missions to promote agricultural exports and calling for coordinated efforts to expand access to international markets and identify new markets for Pakistani products. He also directed the launch of a media campaign to promote a mobile application for crop monitoring, aiming to widen adoption of the tool by making farmers more aware that it exists and encouraging them to actually use it in their day to day operations.
Officials told the meeting that Pakistan’s agricultural exports had reached $5.18 billion during the previous financial year, with rice, fisheries, halal meat, potatoes, sesame, tobacco, mangoes, and maize among the major agricultural exports driving that figure. The meeting also discussed the development of agricultural value chains, with China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other Gulf countries identified as important markets for Pakistani agricultural products going forward. Shehbaz said the National Agriculture and Food Security Council would be activated, with chief ministers representing the provinces, a move that would give provincial leadership a more direct and formal role in shaping national agricultural policy rather than leaving coordination to lower level officials. The meeting also considered proposals for agricultural financing facilities aimed specifically at exporters, with the prime minister stressing the need for coordinated efforts to increase agricultural productivity, improve value addition, and expand Pakistan’s presence in international markets. The session was attended by Planning and Development Minister Ahsan Iqbal, National Food Security and Research Minister Rana Tanveer Hussain, Commerce Minister Jam Kamal Khan, Information Minister Attaullah Tarar, Minister of State for IT and Telecommunications Shaza Fatima Khawaja, and several other senior officials and advisers.
The digitisation push comes as the government has also been working to expand access to financing for farmers more broadly. Earlier in the week, Shehbaz directed banks and financial institutions to increase lending to the agricultural sector, describing agriculture as the backbone of the country’s economy and its development as a national responsibility that requires sustained attention rather than periodic policy announcements. Agricultural lending stood at Rs1.268 trillion as of August 2026, with the government setting a target of increasing that figure to Rs2 trillion by June 2028 under its Access to Finance Plan 2026-28, and Shehbaz calling for farmers to have easy and uninterrupted access to financial resources on favourable terms. The meeting was told that 35,838 applications had been received through the Zarkhez-e app for agricultural loans, with Rs7.35 billion approved and Rs1.96 billion disbursed so far, figures that suggest the digital lending channel is gaining some traction even as the broader financing target remains a considerable distance away. The prime minister also directed the government to actively encourage banks that have played a proactive role in extending loans to farmers, signalling that the administration intends to keep pressure on the financial sector to scale up agricultural lending alongside the digitisation of land and farmer records itself.
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