PCGA defers protest

Keeping in view the country's political and economic conditions, the Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA) has postponed its protest drive for ten days, and the next decision would be taken in the meeting of central executive committee on December 20.
Briefing journalists, the Chairman of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA), Aman-ullah Qureshi, along with Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Saeed, Suhail Mehmood Haral, Fazal Elahi, and Sherbaz Khan, said: "We would safeguard the interest of the growers who run the entire textile industry from ginneries to textile mills and readymade garments industry. If the growers stop to cultivate cotton then there would be no export of textile goods worth $13 billion.
He said that the government should prohibit import of cotton from India via Wagha border because it is mere wastage of foreign exchange. There is ample stock of two million bales in the ginning factories. He said that farmers' associations have also appealed to the PCGA not to go on strike and not to leave them to the mercy of 'beoparis' by suspending the procurement.
He said that Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani also assured the association to resolve their grievances. He said that the government had asked the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) to purchase 0.2 million tons of sugar. Similarly, TCP should purchase at least one million bales on international rates to maintain the market rates.
He said that all member ginners will stop procurement of phutti from growers from December 21, if the CEC of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association (PCGA) decided to stop procurement as a protest, as the government is reluctant to issue instructions to Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) to purchase at least one million bales on international rates.
He said an attractive bailout package was not announced for the ginning industry. This harsh step is to be taken to save the ginners from being bankrupted, said Aman. He said that PCGA had apprised President Zardari, Prime Minister Gilani, and federal and provincial ministers of its grievances and told them that millions of cotton growers are incurring huge financial loss due to monopoly of textile sector and they are being fleeced by the only buyer (Aptma), which has developed a cartel to keep the cotton prices at the lowest ebb.
He said that this situation would ruin the growers as well as ginners if the government did not ask the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) to procure at least one million bales of cotton. Aman said that such elements who were fleecing were enemies of the growers. He said that government had declared the flood-hit areas as calamity affected areas and remitted the agricultural loans but no policy was evolved yet for the rehabilitation of ginning factory of flood-hit areas and farmers of cotton zone.
He said that the government should announce waiving the mark-up on the debt of ginners and all the loans be rescheduled till December 31, 2011. He suggested that minimum support price of cotton be fixed at Rs 6000/maund and appealed to the growers not to lend ears to the rumour-mongers who were spreading baseless rumours that cotton sector was sinking.
He vehemently condemned such elements, particularly brokers and beoparis, who were playing a key role in pushing the cotton sector towards the darkness. He warned the government that farmers would play a decisive role in coming election if the government did not redress their grievances and left them to the mercy of beoparis and textile millers. They said that cotton growers and ginners of Sindh were being fleeced by textile sector because their produce was being purchased on throwaway rates.