October 31, 2003	Friday	Ramazan 4, 1424

KHAIRPUR, Oct 30: Federal Minister for Finance Shoukat Aziz on Thursday said that process of agricultural loans would be made easier.

Speaking at a gathering of abadgars at Phulpota fruit farm near Khairpur he said that government was making all out efforts to turn agriculture sector into an industry and it has initiated many schemes in this regard and abadgars should take benefit from the agricultural policies.

He announced to establish a Dates Research Centre for processing and preservation of dates.

Responding to the demands of the abadgars, he assured that he would try for establishing a cold storage in Khairpur and would speak to Export Promotion Bureau in this regard.

Earlier, the abadgars apprised the federal minister about losses date and cotton crops had sustained due to heavy rains and American Sundhi and demanded to postpone recovery of agriculture loans for one year. The federal minister maintained that their demand would be duly considered. On the request of District Nazim Ms Nafisa Shah the minister inspected cotton and paddy crops destroyed by the pest.

He announced to open a Habib Bank branch at Thehri town and not to shift a branch of National Bank from Khuhra.

He was accompanied by state minister for agriculture and food Sikandar Hayat.

Sukkur correspondent adds: Addressing a press conference here, the Finance Minister said the Kashkol (begging) culture had been done away with. “We are now passing through the last phase of International Monitory Fund (IMF) loans, because we have attained economic security.”

He said that despite acute financial constraints the country has come out of the woods, and “heading towards self-reliance.”

He said the recent damages to the cotton crops in Sindh and Punjab were being assessed by the provincial agriculture departments.

However, he was confident that the losses would be marginal because of increase in the cotton crop area. He said federal government was putting maximum efforts for increasing agriculture output because this was the only way to increase the per capita income of the rural population.

A laboratory to diagnose the menace of pests is being set up at Karachi port at a cost of Rs3.7 billion. He agreed with a reporter that use of spurious drugs and fertilizer had become rampant in the local markets, and assured that provincial governments have been directed for taking stern action against the offenders.

On a question about water reservoirs, the minister said that various options are being considered to increase the storage capacity of dams including building new reservoirs in Sindh, Punjab and NWFP.

Finance minister underlined the need of financial discipline by the governments for which he referred to a bill he had recently presented in the National Assembly for putting a check on the future governments on their lavish and unlimited expenditures.