President Asif Ali Zardari on Tuesday called for providing a reasonable wheat price, making timely interventions and streamlining the procurement process to protect the interest of farmers. He further stressed upon the need of supporting and encouraging farmers, which, he said, would help increase wheat production in the country. He regretted that farmers could not get a reasonable price for the wheat crop as well as faced problems in getting the wheat procurement bags (Bar Dana). The president expressed these views during a meeting to discuss issues related to wheat procurement in the country. Minister for National Food Security and Research (NFS&R), Rana Tanveer Hussain, and senior officials of the Ministry of NFS&R and PASSCO attended the meeting, the President Secretariat Press Wing said in a press release. During the meeting, the president was briefed about the issues faced by farmers regarding wheat procurement and the distribution of ‘bar dana’ to them. Speaking on the occasion, the president highlighted that almost 65% of the country’s population was residing in rural areas and providing adequate wheat price to farmers would help boost the rural economy. He underlined that maintaining strategic food reserves was essential to ensure food security and meet the future food requirements of the country, adding that soft loans should be extended to the private sector to construct silos and modern wheat storage facilities to meet the food requirements of the growing population. The president stressed the need of availability of credible data regarding crops to make timely policy interventions as well as accurately predict the future food needs of the country. He also suggested that the agriculture sector should be deregulated.