Daily Times

This year, the Punjab government has fixed the support price of wheat at only 39,000 rupees, and no formal target has been set to purchase wheat from farmers at the government level.

The Punjab government has also reduced the storage limit of government bags from twelve acres to six acres. In the past, farmers were given 10 bags per acre, which has now been reduced to just 6 bags.

Last year, farmers were given 60 rupees per bag for transportation charges, which have now been reduced to 30 rupees per bag. However, due to inflation, transportation charges have doubled over the years.

Last year, the Punjab government purchased 4.5 million tons of wheat from farmers, and a total target of 7.8 million tons of wheat procurement was set for 2023. However, this time, Pasco will purchase 1.4 million, Sindh 1 million, and Balochistan 50,000 tons of wheat from farmers, which means a total of approximately 2.4 million tons of wheat will be purchased.

Bureaucracy is keeping the government in the dark and collaborating with the mafia to destroy farmers.

The Ministry of National Food Security has warned the Economic Coordination Committee that the approved targets for wheat are insufficient to meet provincial requirements.

Farmers also have to cultivate land for the next season, and they cannot hoard wheat like a mafia. Therefore, they are forced to sell their wheat at nominal prices, which the mafia is buying alongside the flour mafia so that they can benefit from it later when a wheat crisis arises. The limit of government bags has also been reduced to 6 acres, so anyone with more than seven acres of land is forced to buy a bag from the market for 500 rupees.

All of this is happening in collusion with bureaucracy and mafia. Bureaucracy is keeping the government in the dark and collaborating with the mafia to destroy farmers so that a food crisis can be created in Pakistan.

On the other hand, farmers are likening the Punjab government’s new wheat policy to economic genocide. Farmers believe that the agricultural mafia and middlemen are exploiting farmers economically.

Farmers believe that the decision of the Punjab government not to buy wheat will crash the wheat market, making it impossible to receive the government’s fixed support price of 39,000 rupees. And this is happening; wheat has fallen to three thousand rupees per maund in the open market.

On the other hand, the rain has also caused losses, and the standing crops have been destroyed, meaning farmers are suffering on all sides. Farmers are currently looking at Maryam Nawaz and warning: if the government does not resolve their issues, agricultural organizations have threatened to start protest movements.

On the other hand, when we look at the expenditures, they have increased several times over the year. Especially the price of fertilizers has increased more than the government’s fixed price over the year, and farmers are sowing wheat by buying expensive fertilizers.

The situation is the same for diesel and electricity charges, and farmers are unable to pay electricity bills.

The manifestation of enmity towards farmers in Punjab can push the country into a new crisis, which needs to be addressed from now on.

Because in our neighbouring countries, farmers are being given three hundred units of free electricity, while here, one unit has already crossed one hundred rupees.

We have seen in the past that despite being an agricultural country, Pakistan has to import wheat from outside, and when our farmers are not given the cost of production, who benefits from importing expensive wheat from outside?

The government will have to take immediate action on this because, in the recent past, the Pakistan Army and the government had jointly started a Green Incentive Program, and it seems that such conspiracies could also be made to make this Green Initiative unsuccessful.

The writer is an old Aitchisonian who believes in freedom of expression, a freelance columnist, entrepreneur and social activist.