Delays and hurdles : DAP subsidy scheme pushed to ‘the 12th of never’

The project to offer farmers subsidy on purchase of DAP fertilisers is reported to have met some unusual hurdles. Under the once zealous scheme, for each bag of fertiliser bought, farmers were to be given a subsidy worth Rs1,000, where Rs700 were to be met by the centre while the remaining Rs300 were to be covered by the provincial government.

However, owing to absence of proper subsidy payment mechanisms and exclusion of federal government’s financial partnership, the project has now been delayed to what appears like the twelfth of never.

Consequently, farmers across the country and especially those in Punjab, who were counting on the scheme, fear facing intense financial losses in the coming months.

In addition to that, inadequate DAP usage, is also projected to jeopardise the national production target of 20 million tonnes of wheat crop. Which may, at the very least, is feared to contribute to a food crisis in the future.

It is imperative to mention the provincial agriculture department, under the said scheme, had requested the federal government to provide at least four million sacks of DAP fertilisers.

However, reportedly, the provincial agriculture department, owing insufficient funds, failed to offer a subsidy of Rs500 per bag, to hundreds of thousands of farmers during kharif growing season.

Meanwhile, the ministry of national food security has directed all the provinces to submit information about their wheat and cotton requirements, cultivation and expected production by December 31. Based on the information of the federal ministry, the government hopes to plan a strategy for wheat and cotton for the next two years.

“There is no clear mechanism in place for subsidising farmers at the government level in Sindh. On the other hand, the federal ministry of finance also did not approve the scheme either. After which, there was no other fate for the scheme but to be scrapped,” a source privy to the development told The Express Tribune.

Per sources, the Punjab government has been giving farmers a subsidy of Rs500 from its budget for the purchase of DAP fertiliser, under given limits. Yet, under the new scheme, the government had planned to increase the subsidy amount to Rs500 per DAP bag. “Furthermore, the prevalent provincial subsidy of Rs500 by Punjab government is also facing delays due to lack of funds, which has affected thousands of farmers province-wide.”

It is learnt that the federal government had earlier planned to offer a subsidised DAP sack per 12.5 acres of land. But the federal ministry proposed a no-limit policy under the new scheme. However, it was said that the farmers who buy more than 25 sacks of fertiliser were still to be scrutinised by the agriculture department on the use of subsidy.

Pakistan Kisan Ittehad Chairperson Khalid Khokhar confirmed that the Punjab Agriculture Department has failed to provide subsidy on DAP fertilizer to the farmers. “Millions of farmers in Punjab have not been given subsidy payments. This indicates that officials of the agriculture department are colluding with the fertiliser companies to rob farmers of their subsidies,” he alleged.

Speaking further, the chairperson also reported that despite the existing subsidy of Rs500, farmers are often given no response when they apply for subsidy by texting their fertiliser sack card to the designated numbers. “The issue has been raised in several high-level meetings. But department officials always have the same script saying that payments are delayed due to lack of funds, which I suspect is another one of their lie. Similarly the revised subsidy of Rs1,000 which was announced some time ago has also somehow vanished into thin air,” the union leader lamented.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 28^th, 2020.