07 March 2004	Sunday	15 Muharram 1425

SANGHAR, March 6: Growers' associations have demanded that the government should provide state of the art equipment to farmers to achieve a high crop yield.

Small Growers Association general secretary Hassan Askari and Sindh Abadgar Board's Yar Mohammad Leghari said laser-controlled land levellers, owned by the Sindh agriculture department, were not available for small farmers.

They told this correspondent that small growers had deposited the prescribed fee/rent some two years back but still waiting for the provision of equipments.

They said influential landlords had grabbed the land levellers and most of the precious equipments were rusting at their guest houses. The small growers said some 23 laser-controlled machines were provided to the Sindh agriculture department. "One can not get the machinery until and unless he has strong connections at a proper place", they complained.

They said people were approaching the chief minister, chief secretary, agriculture minister or the DG agriculture to get this state-of-the-art machinery.

It might be mentioned that the agriculture experts had calculated a saving of at least 40 per cent of water if lands were precisely levelled.