Daily Times

A few months earlier, news of a brewing wheat crisis flashed on media outlets here, there and everywhere in the wake of import plans announced by the National Food Security Minister. The megastroke worked for a while and the market forces allowed for a relatively ordinary inning. But with the repeated resurgence–even more vigorously–of Punjab wheat worries in the last few years, those pulling up legs and pushing out boats at the first sight of calm waters were clearly mistaken.

The crisis talk is back and this time, it promises to be a tad more complex. Some well-informed birdies are tweeting about the recent release of subsidised wheat by the new (now old and again, new) Punjab government wreaking havoc upon the provincial calculations for the ongoing year.

As much as 20 per cent of the stock has already been consumed. Unfortuantely, the government still has over a month to go before the official release date. We may have fallen more than two million tonnes behind our record wheat production of the yesteryears, but the golden traditions of hastily conceived policies continue.

In the past, the authorities were accused of turning the other cheek to widespread smuggling across the border and letting a faulty permit system overrule all treatises of both logic and economics. Today, Punjab is being blamed for letting its political agenda cloud its financial acumen. How the Food Department would go through the next nine months with just four million tonnes in its hand considerably weighs down the air because the state is in clearly no position to add yet another expensive item to its import bill.

Then again, the risks of this fast-dwindling stock making its inroads into Afghanistan (Pakistani wheat is still considerably cheaper than the international grain) are getting bigger by the day. The apparently aloof executive of the country’s heartland is, however, too consumed by the political crises breathing down its neck to be bothered by such minuscule governance issues. After all, so what if these dire shortages turn into a full-blown headache and the hapless citizenry–stretched too thin by the galloping inflation–is forced to sleep on empty stomachs? The power games must still go on in all their glory. *