As a result of what has been termed anti-agriculture policies by the federal government, the country’s farmers have reportedly suffered an irreversible loss of PKR 800 billion in the wheat crop this year, including PKR 150 billion in Sindh alone. Meanwhile, cotton production has plummeted from 14.5 million bales to just 5 million bales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Madam Saba Yusuf Talpur, Member of National Assembly (MNA) from the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), launched a scathing criticism of the federal government, blaming it for using the IMF as a tool to exploit farmers economically.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a press statement issued from her residence in Hyderabad, she severely criticized the federal government’s agricultural policies. Citing official statistics, she pointed out a record decline in crop production<\/strong> this year: wheat down by 11%, cotton by 30%, rice by 3%, and sugar by 3.9%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She said the main reason behind this decline is the federal government\u2019s failure to set support prices for agricultural commodities under IMF pressure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to her, this year alone, farmers across the country have suffered losses of PKR 800 billion due to wheat production issues, with Sindh bearing PKR 150 billion of the loss.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She emphasized that agriculture is the backbone of Pakistan\u2019s economy, which has now been broken due to flawed government policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She further stated that the government must consider the country\u2019s rapidly growing population and focus on food security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Highlighting the sharp fall in cotton production\u2014from 14.5 million bales to 5 million bales\u2014she said that Pakistan now spends $1.2 billion annually on importing cotton. If local farmers were given fair prices, the country could not only meet its cotton demand domestically but also save over $1 billion in foreign exchange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She added that the government spends $3.8 billion every year<\/strong> to import edible oil. By offering farmers fair prices and promoting the cultivation of sunflower, mustard, soybean, sesame, canola, and other oilseeds, Pakistan could meet its local demand and save significant foreign exchange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She questioned the logic behind importing 500,000 metric tons of sugar when 2.8 million metric tons<\/strong> of sugar stock is already available in the country. She called for activating sugar mills from October 15 instead of November 1<\/strong>, and demanded that the decision to import sugar be immediately reversed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She asserted that with pro-agriculture policies<\/strong>, the government could save $11 billion annually<\/strong> spent on agricultural imports. By supporting farmers, Pakistan could gradually eliminate the need for IMF assistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to her, the only sustainable solution to end dependence on the IMF is to strengthen and stabilize the agriculture sector<\/strong>, which employs over 60% of the country\u2019s rural population and supports the local economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She said PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has consistently raised these concerns on the floor of the assembly, strongly criticizing the federal government for its anti-farmer policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She emphasized that PPP, during its tenures, has always increased support prices for crops and helped farmers, whereas the current government is economically strangling them instead of offering relief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She concluded by demanding that the federal government immediately declare an agricultural emergency<\/strong> and ban the import of agricultural products<\/strong> to protect the country\u2019s farming sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As a result of what has been termed anti-agriculture policies by the federal government, the country’s farmers have reportedly suffered an irreversible loss of PKR 800 billion in the wheat crop this year, including PKR 150 billion in Sindh alone. Meanwhile, cotton production has plummeted from 14.5 million bales to just 5 million bales. Madam […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7549,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","inline_featured_image":false,"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_3859443944190656_798604363342440":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pakistan"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7546"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7550,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7546\/revisions\/7550"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakjazbo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}