Imports from India to continue

Provincial Minister for Agricultural Marketing Rana Qasim Noon has said import of agricultural commodities from India would continue till supply and demand position of essential agriculture commodities was stabilised. He stated this while talking to Business Recorder after addressing a seminar on the "Scope of Establishing Fruit Processing Units" arranged by Habib Bank Limited here on Saturday.
Qasim Noon maintained that import of agricultural commodities from India through land route was a major breakthrough. He called for discouraging those market forces that were creating artificial price hike. In order to provide perishable food items to Pakistani consumers on reasonable rates, there was no harm to import agri commodities from India. "If needed, India can also import various commodities from Pakistan", he added.
He said so far around 50,000 tons of potato and onion has been imported from India. He said Pakistani farmers would not suffer due to import of agri commodities. He further said efforts were underway to increase production of agri commodities within the country. He said Pakistan was already importing garlic and onion from China and India through alternate routes.
To a query, he said government couldn't eliminate the role of middlemen. He said government was trying to improve marketing system of Pakistani agricultural commodities and a number of steps were being taken in that connection.
He said government has signed an agreement with the Chinese government for export of rice and mango. Iran has also decided to invest in Pakistani fruit processing sector. He said government has also allowed livestock product import from India.
Earlier, addressing the seminar the minister said due to lack of post harvest operations/ processing facilities, 10 to 35 per cent of agricultural produce of Pakistan worth 25-35 billion of rupees lost every year. In Pakistan only 2 per cent agriculture commodities were being processed properly. He said MoU has been signed with China under which cheaper processing technology would be made available from China. He was of the view that banks could play important role in promotion of investment in that sector.
Addressing on this occasion, Agri Finance Department head of HBL Zaheer Masood said his bank has shown remarkable results in the field of agriculture financing and also surpassed its annual target fixed by the State Bank of Pakistan.
Punjab Agri Marketing Special Secretary Muhammad Yousaf and Pakistan Horticulture Development and Export Board Chief Executive Shamoon Sadiq, Dr Ahmad Salim Akhtar and Ehsan Elahi Bajwa also spoke on the occasion.