Govt to extend farm sector support to Sindh, Balochistan

ECC meeting today likely to give nod to spread agricultural relief package to farmers of two provinces

ISLAMABAD:

The government has decided to extend the scope of the prime minister’s agricultural relief package to the farmers of Sindh and Balochistan.

The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet will meet on Thursday (today) to discuss a four-point agenda.

The meeting, to be chaired by Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin, is likely to approve a technical supplementary grant for the Export Development Fund. It is also expected to give nod to subsidy to farmers for this year’s Kharif crop.

The participants of the meeting are also likely to approve the setting of the wheat procurement targets at the government level in Sindh and Balochistan along with case credit limits.

In May 2020, the ECC had approved an agricultural relief package to the tune of Rs50 billion proposed by the national food security and research ministry.

The ministry had recommended package worth Rs56.6 billion, but the ECC directed for restricting it to the limit set in the Prime Minister’s Economic Relief Package.

The agriculture package was offered to provide subsidy on fertilisers to the farmers, reduction in bank mark-up on agricultural loans, subsidy on cotton seed and white fly pesticides, and subsidy on sales tax on locally-manufactured light tractors.

Read: ECC okays Rs8.2b Ramazan relief package

The stimulus package was part of the Rs100 billion out of Rs1.20 trillion coronavirus relief package already announced for small and medium enterprises and the farm sector.

Under the package, the government offered a subsidy of Rs37 billion to farmers on the purchase of fertiliser. This amount will include a subsidy of Rs925 per bag on phosphorus fertiliser and Rs243 per bag on urea and other nitrogen fertilisers.

Other items in the relief package included a reduction of Rs8.8 billion in the mark-up of agricultural loans as well as Rs2.3 billion and Rs6 billion subsidies on cotton seed and pesticides respectively.

The government had also granted a subsidy of Rs2.5 billion on the sales tax on locally-manufactured tractors for a period of one year.

The ECC had also called for inclusion of other banks along with Zarai Taraqiati in the scheme to enhance outreach of farmers with focus on subsistence farmers with a land holding of 12.5 acres.

It was suggested that since mark-up had been reduced by the central bank, the interest rates used in the proposal could also be rationalised accordingly.

The ECC had called for the implementation mechanism, especially through the scratch card system, to be monitored carefully to ensure that the actual beneficiaries of the package were genuine farmers.