Agri package

The much sought-after Rs1800 billion package of reforms is a shot in the arm for farmers. The coalition government by allocating an increase of Rs400 billion from last year has tried its best to uplift the backbone sector of the economy. The agriculture output stands devastated for the current fiscal year in the backdrop of monsoon floods and the loss is estimated to the tune of $32 billion. The incentives spelt out in the deal pertain to provision of free seeds and easy loans, as well as bringing down the prices of fertilisers and electricity for tube-wells. It is a welcome development that a staggering Rs10.6 billion were allocated for small farmers, while a special tranche of Rs8 billion is for the flood-affected areas.

The policy has come close on the heels of a standoff in the federal capital, wherein farmers had staged a sit-in for more than two weeks, unnerving the economic wheel at a time when inflation and depreciation of the rupee were at their height. It also stirred instability as the agitation was being equated with political upheavals in the corridors of power. The realisation on the part of the government to appease the depressed farming sector with cash doles and subsidised power tariff is a step in the right direction. Small cultivators and farms to market traders were on the receiving end, as they were literally crushed under unseen destruction in decades.

The provision that unemployed youth in the rural areas would be given loans amounting to a total of Rs50 billion, whereas another Rs6.5 billion earmarked as subsidy to waive off the markup on these loans, will buoy confidence of the agrarian sector. Yet it is too little and that too in odd times, when the next crop is also in a fix. This is why ensuring electricity cost at Rs13 per unit for tube-wells with a subsidy of Rs43 billion for solarisation gadgets is appreciated.

Pakistan is in need of a comprehensive long-term agriculture policy. The focus should be on enhancing the yield per acre of cultivation, and bring it on a par with China and India. Maximum utilisation of available resources with a better generic seed is the way to go.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 2^nd, 2022.

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