Senators belonging to opposition parties on Tuesday rejected the assurance of Federal Minister for National Food Security and Research Khurso Bakhtyar, who claimed there was no wheat/flour shortage in the country.
They claimed that it was totally mismanagement on part of government or inability to deal the matter properly. Why appropriate measures were not taken in advance as the crises of wheat forecasted few months ago. There were crises of gas, tomato, sugar and many more during the PTI government, the opposition senators regretted. They even made hue and cry while the minister was presenting the government’s point of view over the issue. They demanded of the Senate chairman to refer the matter to the committee concerned so as to have proper debate over it. As a result, Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani referred the matter to the committee with the instruction to report the House as soon as possible.
Winding up a discussion on a motion in the Senate, Khusro Bakhtyar said that the federal government had evolved a mechanism with the coordination of provincial governments to end artificial shortfall of wheat in some parts of the country.
He said that four million tonnes of wheat was available in the public sector and there is no shortfall of wheat in the country. He said flour prices in Sindh brought down from 60 to 54 rupees while in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 58 to 52 rupees per kg. The Minister said that government has raised the minimum support price of wheat from 1300 to 1365 rupees per 40 kg.
The crisis arises when supply chain of wheat/flour disturb in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh. The situation was further deteriorated for Sindh when the supply badly affected from transporters strike.
About the export/import of wheat, the minister said that it was not for the first time that the government first export and now importing the commodity.