November 2, 2001	Friday	Shaba’an 15, 1422

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MULTAN, Nov 1: The government has decided to ban the import of cotton except the long staple which the country is unable to produce so far.

This was stated by Federal Agriculture Minister Khair Muhammad Junejo while talking to representatives of growers and ginners at the local circuit house on Thursday.

He said the experiment to produce long staple cotton in the country could not bear fruits so its import to meet the textile sector requirements was unavoidable. But the government would discourage the import of any other cotton form to safeguard the interest of farming community.

The government, he said, realized the importance of the agriculture sector in the economic revival and for this purpose efforts were being made for the well-being of farming community.

To minimize the effects of taxes on the agriculture sector, the duty on the import of raw material used in pesticides had been reduced from 20 per cent to only five per cent, he said.

Similarly, the fertilizer units were directed to pay sales tax from their profits instead of shifting it to consumers by increasing prices.

Citing government measures to uplift the agriculture sector, he said 10,000 tubewells would be installed in the country on equity basis. He said 3,000 tubewells would be installed this year with 50 per cent government assistance, adding the agriculture ministry had demanded Rs1 billion to materialize the project.

Mr Junejo said the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) had been actively participating in cotton buying as a public sector intervention to stabilize cotton market prices in domestic trade. He said a premium of Rs200 was also announced on producing the contamination-free cotton.

To monitor the quality of agriculture produces, one each laboratory would be set up in Karachi, Faisalabad and Islamabad, he said.

At least Rs45 billion were allocated last year to advance loans in the agriculture sector which had been enhanced to Rs65 billion this year, he said. “The government wants to bring this allocation to the tune of Rs100 billion per annum,” he said.

Mr Junejo said the State Bank had directed commercial banks to also advance agriculture loans at the interest rate of 10 per cent instead of 14.

The ministry, he said, had submitted a summary to the government regarding the support price of wheat for the coming rabi season. He underlined the need to export surplus wheat to ensure fair returns to growers. “Quality will count largely in achieving this goal,” he stressed, saying, “our surplus wheat could not find buyers in international market last year only because of the quality reasons.”

Grower representatives expressed their dissatisfaction over what they termed slow buying by the TCP, while ginners alleged the TCP had not so far done any significant business in the market.

They urged the import registration system could be introduced to check unbridled import of cotton.

They also accused the official circles of formulating false datas to shield their inefficiencies and incompetencies.

They also condemned official revenue teams which had started raiding farmers at a time when they had just begun harvesting their crops.