Tiger Awan
SENIOR MEMBER
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PML-N
The PML-N certainly has an edge when it comes to writing agriculture manifestos. And the person to make the difference is Mr Sartaj Aziz former food, finance and foreign minister.
That is precisely why the PML-N agriculture manifesto makes a more logical case for the sector. This is also why the manifesto links agriculture with food security, and promises to seek parliamentary approval for adding a new article to the constitution to make the right-to-food a fundamental right of every citizen within a reasonable timeframe.
The government will formulate, in consultation with provincial governments, a National Strategy For Food Security, to achieve an average growth of at least four per cent per annum in the next decade, as well as evolve an equitable system of food procurement and distribution, improve access of poor households to food at affordable prices, and evolve a transparent system of safety nets for very poor households.
Aziz is heading a private university these days, which has calculated that 43.01 per cent (or a staggering 79.08 million) people had fallen below the poverty line by 2012. The study shows that by 2007-08, the poverty level had reached 33.8 per cent, which is about the same level as the high point of 2001-02. The absolute number of poor increased from 40.35 million in 1998-99 to 56.55 million in 2007-08 an addition of around 16 million more people in eight years. In the next four years (2008-12), the poverty level rose to 43.01 per cent, and 22.53 million people fell below the poverty line.
Even when he was looking after the economy, Aziz was regularly teased of being the food minister, because of his sensitivity to the issue. This was something he had developed during his long stint at the Food and Agriculture Organisation.
This is the reason that PML-N has set food security as the number one issue in its manifesto, and one hopes that the party will not forget its pledge, if it is voted to power.
No PML-N document can be more right when it maintains that it is also clear from Pakistans own experience that marginal adjustments in development policies will not address the issue of mass poverty. A paradigm shift will be needed to evolve pro-poor growth strategies that will change institutions and local power structures in favour of the poor, by giving them greater access to productive assets such as land and livestock and facilities for acquiring education and skills.
Other important elements of such a pro-poor growth strategy will be increasing non-farm employment in rural areas through small and medium enterprises and greater stability in food prices.But the party promises to maintain two parallel trends.
On the one hand, it claims to focus on small farmers as the real backbone of rural economy and assure their access to knowledge, inputs and markets. Yet on the other, it also wants to revitalise corporate agriculture to overcome the limitation of small landowners by setting up land development corporations with majority equity of the poor and managed by professional managers.
By doing so, it plans to convert Pakistan into a large net exporter of food and high value crops to regional markets by modernising post-harvest storage and marketing systems. There is very large demand for halal products in these markets.
However, the PML-N, perhaps deliberately, remains vague on the water sector, as it writes that it will build consensus on the basis of the 1991 Water Accord to allow new water projects (avoids naming them) to be undertaken and extension of irrigation facilities to additional areas; increase irrigation intensity through fuller utilisation of available water resources by expanding on-farm water management programmes, and generating hydroelectricity on a large scale from local water reservoirs and small dams; and, launch major programme of aquifer recharge in arid and semi-arid areas of Cholistan, Thar and Balochistan to ensure that water flows from tubewells installed in these areas can be sustained.
One can only hope that the party does not forget its promise of giving high priority to the development of the livestock sector and self-sufficiency in oilseeds, as a part of an overall programme to fisheries and horticulture crops like fruits, vegetables and dates will be given special incentives. The party has also promised to reform the agriculture credit system to ensure that at least 50 per cent of the total is provided to small farmers and that land owners are able to obtain credit on the basis of the market value of the land rather than outdated produce index units, and give high priority to women borrowers in micro credit programmes.
The manifesto goes on to state that the PML-N would undertake immediate updating of revenue and property records using modern information technology. Based on the information so generated, benamis can be eliminated, property rights of female members protected, and better access to credit facilitated. Revamp all research organisations to ensure that there is sustained increase in productivity to meet the demands of a growing population and that the benefits of research actually reach the farmers.
Under its land reform programme, [the party] will reclaim and irrigate additional land for allotment to landless, women, haris and tenants. It will also undertake a land consolidation programme to create viable units for modern agriculture.
The PML-Ns manifesto, like those of other major parties, makes all kinds of right noises. It points out weaker or missing links, and commits to dealing with them. It encapsulates it all when it says that it would turn agriculture into a fully-viable economic industry by changing the policy framework and terms of trade in favour of agriculture.
No one doubts the partys ability to write a better piece before elections. However, anxiety remains about its post-election behaviour, if it is voted to power, and its treatment of the sector. One can only keep their fingers crossed and wait.
The PML-N certainly has an edge when it comes to writing agriculture manifestos. And the person to make the difference is Mr Sartaj Aziz former food, finance and foreign minister.
That is precisely why the PML-N agriculture manifesto makes a more logical case for the sector. This is also why the manifesto links agriculture with food security, and promises to seek parliamentary approval for adding a new article to the constitution to make the right-to-food a fundamental right of every citizen within a reasonable timeframe.
The government will formulate, in consultation with provincial governments, a National Strategy For Food Security, to achieve an average growth of at least four per cent per annum in the next decade, as well as evolve an equitable system of food procurement and distribution, improve access of poor households to food at affordable prices, and evolve a transparent system of safety nets for very poor households.
Aziz is heading a private university these days, which has calculated that 43.01 per cent (or a staggering 79.08 million) people had fallen below the poverty line by 2012. The study shows that by 2007-08, the poverty level had reached 33.8 per cent, which is about the same level as the high point of 2001-02. The absolute number of poor increased from 40.35 million in 1998-99 to 56.55 million in 2007-08 an addition of around 16 million more people in eight years. In the next four years (2008-12), the poverty level rose to 43.01 per cent, and 22.53 million people fell below the poverty line.
Even when he was looking after the economy, Aziz was regularly teased of being the food minister, because of his sensitivity to the issue. This was something he had developed during his long stint at the Food and Agriculture Organisation.
This is the reason that PML-N has set food security as the number one issue in its manifesto, and one hopes that the party will not forget its pledge, if it is voted to power.
No PML-N document can be more right when it maintains that it is also clear from Pakistans own experience that marginal adjustments in development policies will not address the issue of mass poverty. A paradigm shift will be needed to evolve pro-poor growth strategies that will change institutions and local power structures in favour of the poor, by giving them greater access to productive assets such as land and livestock and facilities for acquiring education and skills.
Other important elements of such a pro-poor growth strategy will be increasing non-farm employment in rural areas through small and medium enterprises and greater stability in food prices.But the party promises to maintain two parallel trends.
On the one hand, it claims to focus on small farmers as the real backbone of rural economy and assure their access to knowledge, inputs and markets. Yet on the other, it also wants to revitalise corporate agriculture to overcome the limitation of small landowners by setting up land development corporations with majority equity of the poor and managed by professional managers.
By doing so, it plans to convert Pakistan into a large net exporter of food and high value crops to regional markets by modernising post-harvest storage and marketing systems. There is very large demand for halal products in these markets.
However, the PML-N, perhaps deliberately, remains vague on the water sector, as it writes that it will build consensus on the basis of the 1991 Water Accord to allow new water projects (avoids naming them) to be undertaken and extension of irrigation facilities to additional areas; increase irrigation intensity through fuller utilisation of available water resources by expanding on-farm water management programmes, and generating hydroelectricity on a large scale from local water reservoirs and small dams; and, launch major programme of aquifer recharge in arid and semi-arid areas of Cholistan, Thar and Balochistan to ensure that water flows from tubewells installed in these areas can be sustained.
One can only hope that the party does not forget its promise of giving high priority to the development of the livestock sector and self-sufficiency in oilseeds, as a part of an overall programme to fisheries and horticulture crops like fruits, vegetables and dates will be given special incentives. The party has also promised to reform the agriculture credit system to ensure that at least 50 per cent of the total is provided to small farmers and that land owners are able to obtain credit on the basis of the market value of the land rather than outdated produce index units, and give high priority to women borrowers in micro credit programmes.
The manifesto goes on to state that the PML-N would undertake immediate updating of revenue and property records using modern information technology. Based on the information so generated, benamis can be eliminated, property rights of female members protected, and better access to credit facilitated. Revamp all research organisations to ensure that there is sustained increase in productivity to meet the demands of a growing population and that the benefits of research actually reach the farmers.
Under its land reform programme, [the party] will reclaim and irrigate additional land for allotment to landless, women, haris and tenants. It will also undertake a land consolidation programme to create viable units for modern agriculture.
The PML-Ns manifesto, like those of other major parties, makes all kinds of right noises. It points out weaker or missing links, and commits to dealing with them. It encapsulates it all when it says that it would turn agriculture into a fully-viable economic industry by changing the policy framework and terms of trade in favour of agriculture.
No one doubts the partys ability to write a better piece before elections. However, anxiety remains about its post-election behaviour, if it is voted to power, and its treatment of the sector. One can only keep their fingers crossed and wait.
