Tehreek-e-Insaf wants agriculture emergency imposed

Shah Mehmood lambasts govt over agriculture policy

ISLAMABAD:

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) urged the government to immediately impose an agriculture emergency and start addressing farmers’ issues on Tuesday.

“I demand that the rulers impose an agriculture emergency in the country with immediate effect,” PTI senior leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi insisted while addressing a press conference at the National Press Club.

Qureshi referred to the Rs341 billion Kissan Package announced by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif as a joke, since the farmers have not been given the promised incentives. “Where is the Kissan Package?” he questioned.

The PTI leader revealed that farmers have prepared a ‘charter of demands’ to be presented before the political leadership of the country at a conference on Wednesday. Having made it all the way to Islamabad with the hope that the rulers would pay heed to their issues, he said that the farmers are asking politicians to get over their political differences and join hands for the farmers rights. Though the farmers have invited Finance Minister Ishaq Dar and Minister for National Food Security and Research Sikandar Khan Bosan amongst others, Qureshi further invited ruling party MPs to attend the conference.

Referring to several meetings of standing committees and lower house proceedings, he said that the government has admitted the fact that some of the schemes were from previous governments and MPs of the ruling party privately relate that they cannot face people of their respective constituencies, as they are also farmers and understand the miseries of people.

Talking about the Rs5,000 per acre cash grant promised to the farmers through the Kissan Package, Qureshi said that “the money was disbursed in a few constituencies where by-elections were held.”

He said that Nawab Yousuf Talpur of Pakistan Peoples Party was his rival during the general elections in Umerkot but now “he has joined me to protest against the attitude of his own provincial government.” He invited the media to ‘go and ask the farmers’ whether they have received the cash grant or not, particularly in Southern Punjab and Sindh.

While sharing some statistics, he said that growth of the agriculture sector had been less than three per cent which meant poverty is on the rise in the rural areas of Pakistan. This is pushing poor people to migrate from rural areas to urban centres in search of a livelihood, he added.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 24^th, 2016.