Pakistan Business Forum (PBF) Vice President Jahan Ara Wattoo has said that Pakistan’s agriculture sector has great potential and its current contribution of US $ 03 billion to the economy can be doubled with viable approaches encompassing all the aspects of this vital sector as well as the concerns of the stakeholders.
Addressing a workshop here Saturday, she said that in order to realize the full agricultural potential, there is a dire need to control cartels in the commodity markets thus enabling the crop component of the agri sector to yield tangible results.
She cited that the government is pinning high hopes on cotton growers and when it declared an indicative price of Rs 8,500 per 40k, it led to a strong revival of crops, and production doubled in a matter of one season. However, as soon as cotton started arriving in the market, the price crashed to Rs 6,500 per maund as the market cartels robbed the farmers of their hard-earned money.
“We observed the same phenomenon in the maize crop and its price dwindled to half of its pre-sowing value. In a production cycle with very high costs, price slides like these leave farmers crippled for years.
For urea alone, the growers paid more than Rs 120 billion to black marketers this season, as the urea bags were being sold in the market at four different prices,” she maintained.—APP
