PHOTO: APP
“The survey will cover all aspects of food security such as availability, accessibility, affordability and nutrition,” said National Food Security and Research Minister Sikandar Hayat Khan Bosan at a workshop on “Global strategy to improve agriculture and rural statistics”.
The workshop was arranged by the national food security ministry in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the Agriculture Policy Institute.
The minister said a sample of the survey would include 20,000 people from rural and urban areas. Reliable data played a pivotal role in policymaking and the flow of statistics from tehsils to districts, districts to provinces and finally to the national level must be streamlined, he said.
“The ministry has a comprehensive and well-organised system of compiling agricultural statistics, which will be helpful in policymaking.”
The system covers all provinces as well as Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Gilgit Baltistan and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata). All sub-sectors of the agriculture sector such as crops, livestock, fisheries, forestry, marketing, land record and irrigation are taken into account while preparing the annual statistical report.
Bosan, however, acknowledged deficiencies in the statistical system, stressing that attention should be paid to record automation, uniformity in collection methodology, estimation and assessment of all sets of data, better coordination at the national level and participation of all stakeholders.
According to available data, despite the presence of surplus food in the country, 15% of the population is food insecure and 24% of children are malnourished because of lack of access to food
Published in The Express Tribune, November 5th, 2015.
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