Sindh PA adopts resolution: government asked to ensure timely provision of sacks to growers

The Sindh Assembly on Tuesday adopted a resolution unanimously asking the provincial government to ensure provision of sacks for grains to farmers on time. Nusrat Sehar Abbasi of PML-F tabled the resolution in the house on private members' day that the house voted unanimously asking the Sindh government to ensure timely provision of sacks to the growers for grains collection.
The resolution also showed concerns over the delay of sacks provision and want of grain collection centres in parts of the province, asking the government to step up its efforts and help the growers to avoid losses and hardships. The Opposition lawmakers also protested over the sacks provision only to the influential people and the farmers are forced to sell their grain in the open markets to traders.
Sindh Food Minister, Syed Nasir Hussain Shah assured the house that the government would leave no stone unturned to ensure provision of sacks to farmers indiscriminately. This year, the province has produced six million tons of wheat, he told the house, saying that the government had a target of purchasing only 1.1 million tons of the commodity. The official rates for the wheat grain is higher than that of the open market, he said that the growers were, therefore struggling to sell their commodity to the government to fetch maximum but would be next to impossible to the authorities to make any additional offers for the excess buying.
However he assured the government would make efforts to buy the commodity from the poor growers. He accepted that the government's lower cadre officials were not dealing properly with the sacks' distributions on a just basis. He said that there had been some complaints in this connection.
He said the department was short of officials though in the past corrupt officials had been removed from their posts. "This is our compulsion to appoint those officials again on the same post since we are not having many," he said, adding that there was a need to improve the management of the department and scale up activities. He pointed out that the wheat grain prices were low on the market, which made the government realise the local growers concerns and financial hardships. If the government did not buy wheat from the local growers then they will be unable to find better rates for their commodity, he said.
The minister also protested that the Pasco was not buying the allocated share from Sindh that was about 255,000 tons. He said that the Pasco was buying wheat from Sindh lesser than the exact quota. He asked the federal government to make the Pasco buy the Sindh's share of wheat.