Political parties need to spell out a clear-cut policy on land reforms: experts

Media professionals urged to take up issue.

ISLAMABAD:

Speakers at a workshop called for land and agrarian reforms to get rid of the country’s colonial economic power structure and claimed that none of the political parties have adopted a clear stance on the issue.

They were speaking at a two-day training workshop for the media on “Land reforms: food security, poverty alleviation, sustainable environment development” on Tuesday. Participants urged the media to press political parties to include land reforms in their election manifestos.

Tanveer Arif, a land reforms specialist and chief executive of Society for Conservation and Protection of Environment (SCOPE), said that effective land reforms were critical for sustainable food security, increased farm productivity, poverty alleviation and overall socio-economic uplift.



“About two-fifths of workers are engaged in agriculture, which contributes to one-tenth of GDP. Farmland is not just an economic commodity; it is also a source of social and political power. Land ownership is highly skewed,” he said.

Large farms have approached the maximum yield per acre with the available technology, Arif said. “Further growth in agricultural production depends on raising the yield per acre of smaller farms,” he added. Feudalism and inequitable distribution of land was one of the biggest hurdles in quelling this menace. According to Arif, over 50% of rural households are landless.

Mehmood from Gharib Kissan Tehrik was of the view that in 62 countries of the world, 41 states were involved in the land-grabbing. “Besides, the fast-growing phenomenon of giving land on lease or selling it out is another setback to land reforms,” he said. In recent years United Arab Emirates has purchased 324,000 hectares in Punjab for hunting and farming, he added.

Mazhar Arif, who has researched on agrarian reforms and food security, remarked that corporate agricultural farming policy, announced during the Musharraf regime, can only fuel economic and food insecurity. “Corporate farming will displace farm labour and further jeopardise their livelihoods,” he said.



Speaking on the history of land reforms, he said they were an unfinished agenda. “Pakistan has experienced three attempts at ineffective land reforms in 1959, 1972 and 1977, while the state’s takeover of land from large landowners and its allotment to the landless farmers did not achieve a fair deal due to the political power wielded by the landowning classes.”

The verdict of the Supreme Court’s Shariah bench which declared land reforms against Islamic principles should be reviewed and revoked through legislation, he added. Mazhar stressed for a ceiling on land ownership per family for which necessary legislation should be introduced.

SCOPE in collaboration with OXFAM, Novib International, Land Watch Asia, the International Land Coalition and National Peasants Coalition of Pakistan (Pakistan Kisan Sangat) organised the workshop.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 23^rd, 2013.