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SAB demands heavy subsidy for farm sector or ban on imports from India |
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HYDERABAD: The Sindh Abadgar Board (SAB) in its monthly meeting held here on Saturday said that the most favoured nation (MFN) status to India should be granted only after providing a level-playing field to Pakistani farmers otherwise it would be catastrophic for the agriculture sector, food security and economic sovereignty.
Until the requisite is ensured, no agriculture produce and related commodities be imported from India, it demanded.
The meeting, chaired by Abdul Majeed Nizamani, noted that the cost of production in the agriculture sector had increased manifold over the past few years which had left the agriculture sector without profitability.
Had this sector still been profitable, the developed countries like the United States and European countries would not have extended billions of dollars to the home farm sector in subsidy, it argued.
The meeting also noted that even India was providing a heavy subsidy to the agriculture sector which came to about 15 per cent of its GDP. In addition, it said, indirect subsidy was also given whereas seeds were provided to farmers almost free of cost.
The meeting observed that the agriculture sector in Pakistan was the only example around the world where no subsidy was given whereas 17.5 per cent GST was being recovered on agricultural produce.
Describing the situation as great injustice with the rural population, the meeting urged parliamentarians belonging to the rural areas of Sindh in particular and other provinces in general to work towards granting of a subsidy for the agriculture sector on a par with the one in India and ensure that import of agricultural commodities from India was banned until the objective was met.
The SAB meeting said that a bag of urea cost Pakistani farmers Rs1,850 while it was available to farmers in India for an amount equal to Rs510 in Pakistani currency.
Similarly, the diesel price in India was Rs85 per litre as against Rs115 a litre in Pakistan.
The meeting said that if the Pakistan government was not able to grant a matching subsidy, the goods imported from India should be subject to an import duty equivalent to the amount of subsidy.
It stressed that any change in the trade policy should be made only after consulting all stakeholders, including growers organisations on the basis of parity.
The meeting demanded a subsidy of $31.5 billion (or 10 per cent of the GDP) for the agriculture sector, fixing of reasonable support price for 25 farm products and indirect subsidy on seeds, agriculture implements and electricity.
It called for fixing Rs1,400 and Rs210 per 40 kilograms as support prices for wheat and sugarcane, respectively, in view of the increasing cost of production otherwise a food insecurity issue could hit the country .
The meeting called for building reservoirs across Sindh to store water given the fact that water scarcity had been increasing with each passing day.
It called for a highly efficient irrigation system, adding that a feasibility by some international consultant should be got prepared for building the Sehwan barrage-cum-Manchhar dam for storing two million acre feet water. All direct outlets created in violation of the Irrigation Act should be dismantled, it said.
The board strongly recommended that all main canals, distributaries and channels be lined, encroachment over old natural waterways be demolished, flows of toxic water from Punjab be checked, the water rotation system be put to an end, all Scarp (Salinity Control and Reclamation Project) tube-wells be made operational within a month, and rice cultivation within the command areas of perennial canals be banned.
The meeting also expressed its concern over worsening law and order in the province, and said that crime had now become an industry. “Criminals are patronised at the higher levels and this is badly affecting the agriculture sector as well,” it said, and called for extension of the ongoing Karachi operation to the entire Sindh.
It said that the agencies concerned must recover illicit weapons from criminals across the country, especially Sindh.
Source : dawn.com
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