Tharparkar tragedy: Why famine would happen in a democracy

Cause of crisis is govt’s control over wheat supply, instead of letting market run.

ISLAMABAD: More than 150 children, and thousands of livestock, on whom the livelihood of citizens of Tharparkar mostly depends, tragically died in the last couple of months due to drought-like conditions and food shortages.

The area had, however, no shortage of wheat. Thousands of bags filled with wheat, stored in government warehouses in the area, waited for notification of a government official, but in vain. That it took the erstwhile deputy commissioner to take notice after a lapse of three months, and our media to notice this gross negligence after another two months have masked the real systematic cause of the crisis: the government control.

Why the government had to procure and store wheat in its warehouses for a long time only to be released after a notification?

What would happen if the same wheat stock was available with private warehouses and what action would they have taken in a condition of drought and food shortage?

In other words, how results of an official signature would have varied from a market signal?

I will show how responses of the ‘political society’ including politicians, bureaucrats and judiciary would differ from that of the ‘civil society’ including private businesses and private buyers.

Here is what the political society has done so far.

The Sindh government has announced establishing the Thar Development Corporation to cope with the drought-like situation in the district. Thus, the state has expanded.

The chairman of the PPP, currently ruling the Sindh province, instead of being critical of its government, came up with this statement: “My sons haven’t brought drought in Tharparkar as the media reports. Why don’t the media take names of Arbabs, Shah Mehmood and Pir Pagaro’s supporters, who also get elected from Tharparkar?”

The courts have swung into action. The Sindh High Court’s monitoring team, led by Tharparkar’s senior civil judge, has raided depots in Islamkot and Diplo, and deemed the distribution process slow. The judge has asked the media to inform his team of reports of negligence or corruption by government servants involved in the relief process.

Let me narrate this “system”. To solve the problem of lack of access to and distribution of wheat, our collective conscience has devised an ingenious solution: politicians are leading the process of wheat distribution, bureaucrats are assisting them, judges are inspecting the food depots, and media is watching the distribution. Is there something odd in this equation, which otherwise is a simple exchange of commodities?

Market role

Where is the market, usually considered selfish and sinful, in this puzzle?

To understand the role of market in shortages, whether caused by an actual shortfall in production or a short supply in distribution, consider two agents: the consumer or buyer of wheat and seller or the middleman ‘hoarding’ wheat.

Here is what a victim of the drought and food shortage, our consumer, said while talking to a newspaper, “we aren’t beggars.” He said: “We can work and earn for our children. How much and for how many days will we be given food?”

Naroo, a resident of village Lonyar, who was preparing to move to Nawabshah, refusing to rely on relief support, said: “We’ll come back within two months with sufficient wheat and cash to last us for a while.”

This is the typical response of locals, those industrious, dignified and self-respecting citizens. They are willing to do work and earn their living instead of begging the politicians, who in any case, spend taxpayers’ money for charitable media sessions.

The middlemen, unfortunately infamous for ‘hoarding’, do a great service. They accumulate goods when they are plenty, and cheap; and sell them when they are short, and hence dear. Thus they stabilise flow of goods. This is exactly what would have happened if wheat was available with the markets of Tharparkar instead of being locked up in government warehouses, waiting for the official signature instead of market signal.

No doubt, the goods would have become expensive, but at least they would have been available. The industrious citizens would have bought it, may be on credit, and some would have obtained it with the support from altruistic institutions of our civil society, including the likes of Edhi. Wheat would have eventually reached where it was needed the most.

Amartya Sen has famously argued that famines do not happen in democracies. He is wrong: democracies can easily fall to famines if markets are not present.

The author is founder and Executive Director of PRIME Institute, a public policy think tank based in Islamabad

Published in The Express Tribune, April 7^th, 2014.

Like Business on Facebook, follow @TribuneBiz on Twitter to stay informed and join in the conversation.