Govt ignored agri sector in upcoming budget: SAB

The Sindh Abadgar Board (SAB) has deplored that the government appears indifferent to budgetary suggestions of their cohort as no consultative process has got underway with only few days left in the budget presentation.

A meeting of the board, a group which lobbies for the rights of farmers, was held in Hyderabad on Thursday with Mahmood Nawaz Shah in the chair. The meeting underlined that the prevailing slump in agricultural economy, on the contrary, called for painstaking pre-budget deliberations among the stakeholders.

The growers found fault with what they described as the government's 'cherry-pick' policy with regard to their sector's deregulation which, they claimed, is now being manipulated by the traders to the detriment of their corps. They contended that the actual deregulation of the agro-economy also encompassed free export of the agricultural produce, which to the utter disadvantage of the agriculturists, is being retrained.

"[Besides] the export will only enhance when the agricultural industry is competitive. One of the aspects of competitiveness is to analyze the international prices which are backed by heavy subsidies in input costs like in India," they said. They pointed out that they will become competitive with foreign growers when a robust infrastructure is provided to the rural economy.

"The anomaly of 18% GST [General Sales Tax] on locally produced cotton and the duty free import of cotton ought to be removed." The meeting also demanded withdrawal of the GST from imported and locally made machinery, implements and tractors.

The measures like arranging subsidised credit, grants, equity participation and public private partnership have also become essential to support the sector with which the livelihood of tens of millions of people is connected.

They gave reference of India, which has converted 22% of their area to high efficiency systems whereas Pakistan has not achieved even 0.5% target.

Livestock

The SAB has discredited the official figure of the livestock sector's over 4% growth in the ongoing fiscal. The Federal Planning Commission's working paper for the upcoming federal budget speaks about 4.7% expansion in the sector over the previous year.