Agriculture : ‘Consult growers on cotton support price’

Siraj says diesel and electricity to farmers should be subdisided

LAHORE: Jamaat-i-Islami chief Sirajul Haq has demanded that the chief minister fix support price of paddy at Rs2,500 per maund and to consult growers before fixing the price of cotton.

The senator was speaking to Kissan Board president Nisar Ahemd, who met him at Mansoora on Sunday. They told him about problems faced by the farming community.

Siraj said that uncultivated state land should be allotted to landless tillers. “Diesel and electricity should be provided for agricultural tube wells at subsidised rates.” The JI said the government must allocate more resources for rural areas to improve the plight of the villagers.

He said there was a need to create a foolproof security system to ensure reasonable return to growers and to end exploitation by middlemen. He said new dams should be constructed to improve irrigation water resources.

Haq said the government had left the country’s rural population at the mercy of feudal lords who “treated them like animals”. The JI chief said the government’s policies had ruined agriculture and that farmers were finding it hard to make both ends meet.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 19^th, 2016.