PRIME Minister Imran Khan Thursday warned that if food crops production did not increase and the population explosion continued, the country might face famine and poverty in the years to come.
Addressing the Kisan Card distribution ceremony at Dera Ismail Khan, he highlighted the issue of population explosion and the need to make Pakistan self-sufficient in food crops.
The issues of population explosion and food security have been there since long but regrettably no worthwhile efforts were made by any Government in the past to resolve them despite bright prospects for their satisfactory solution.
Like polio, we have not been able to create national consensus on the need for population control and as a result the population is increasing at an alarming pace as population growth rate seems to be more than the agriculture growth rate.
It is also lamentable that Pakistan has fertile land and a vast irrigation system but still it frequently faces shortage of agricultural commodities and shamefully even the staple foods are imported in huge quantities to meet the growing domestic requirements.
Only the other day, the Economic Coordination Committee of the Cabinet (ECC) approved further import of wheat and sugar despite claims that the country recently had a bumper wheat crop.
Given the mounting challenges in the way of effective implementation of population control policies, the country is left with the only option of developing its agriculture on modern lines and it is good that a beginning has been made by the incumbent government.
For decades, the country failed to take practical measures for addition of water storage capacity despite paper plans for construction of a number of dams.
The credit goes to the PTI Government for launching actual work on construction of ten water storage projects including simultaneous implementation of two mega water reservoirs despite paucity of funds and resources.
The Central Kisan Credit Card scheme has been in vogue in neighbouring India since 1998 where it has contributed a lot in resolving day-to-day problems of the farmers, leading to improvement in productivity and a reduction in malnutrition and the instance of poverty.
A similar scheme has been launched in Pakistan providing farmers access to short-term credit enabling them to timely procure pesticides, seeds, fertilizers and other essential items by collecting subsidy amount directly from the ATM through Kisan Card besides possibility of prompt disbursal of compensation in case of damaged crops.
Therefore, the Kisan Card can bring about a revolution in the country by making the life of farmers easy through the use of technology, enhancing agricultural production and saving foreign exchange.
Faulty planning and policies are also reflected in the fact that the country continues to import edible oil and oilseeds worth billions of dollars even after over seven decades of independence.
This is because still the country is hardly managing to produce only 32 percent of edible oil to meet domestic consumption and the remaining 68 percent is imported from different countries straining our precious foreign exchange reserves.
In this backdrop, the present Government has initiated a successful programme for enhancing local production of oil including olive oil.
Olive oil cultivation is gaining momentum worldwide because of its huge benefits and based on successful experiments by Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC), PTI Government has launched a programme to enhance the present cultivated area of 27,000 hectares to 70,000 hectares.
The Prime Minister has also announced that plans, have also been prepared to make the country self-sufficient in other food items especially pulses, which augur well for efforts to achieve food security for the growing population.
No doubt, the Government is providing the right kind of incentives to farmers but the desired results can only be achieved if the existing exploitative system is reformed and overhauled as the benefits are pocketed by vested interests.
This is evident from the fact that the Government hiked the procurement price of wheat significantly to encourage farmers to grow more wheat but the shortage is persisting as farmers are not getting the guaranteed price while consumers are getting the basic food item at much more price than the announced by the Government.
Use of modern technology, availability of high yielding seeds and a meaningful reduction in cost of input can help bring about a real revolution.
