KARACHI: Sites for vegetable markets selected: Dairy villages planned
KARACHI, June 19: The locations have been decided for establishment of two more vegetable markets near Ghakhar Phatak at National Highway and at RCD Highway. In order to review the setting up of new sabzi mandis, rights of consumers and to maintain a system to monitor the price structure, a meeting was held at the Governor’s House with Dr Ishratul Ibad in the chair. Among others, the meeting was attended by chief secretary, additional chief secretary local government, secretaries industries and agriculture, EDOs Revenue and Investment, CPLC chief, and Prof Shahida Wazarat of Karachi University.
The governor had earlier issued the directive for setting up of two more vegetable markets in different parts of the city in order to control prices and break the mafia involved.
The authorities concerned briefed the governor about the progress made so far in this respect.
Ishratul Ibad called for accelerated progress in the establishment of new vegetable markets and directed that cooperation of private sector be sought in this regard and all the work be completed in a transparent manner.
He expressed hope that the project would contribute in providing price relief to people and facilitate in the availability of quality items and their easy transportation as well.
Besides, he said that pressure on traffic, being faced because of only one market, would also reduce.
The progress made in respect of Consumer Rights Council, established at Governor’s House on the pattern of CPLC, was also reviewed. The CRC will be responsible for protection of rights of consumers through continuous monitoring and research of prices, quality and other aspects.
In this regard, the work will be carried out under the supervision of Prof Shahida Wazarat, Director KU Area Economic Research Centre. For provision of information to public, a website of the Consumer Rights Council would also be developed.
It was pointed out that initially there would be monitoring of essential consumer items and Consumer Rights Council would work as a pilot project in Karachi and later its working would be expanded to other parts of the province.
Additional Chief Secretary Local Government informed the meeting about the steps taken for CRC, establishment of vegetable markets and other arrangements and the progress made in respect of decisions taken in previous meetings.
He informed that besides identification of land for the markets, funds had also been allocated in the budget for development works. He said that research cell of CRC would monitor the information available from consumers regarding prices, quality and availability of consumer items. He said this would help in taking steps to maintain prices at an appropriate level because it would be based on information directly obtained from consumers and related quarters and would serve as a transparent record.
The additional chief secretary also briefed the meeting about details of proposed dairy villages. He said there was plan for establishment of dairy villages on 800acre areas in Karachi, Thatta, Badin and Hyderabad where farms of five acres each would be developed.
He said the establishment of dairy villages would help meet the requirement of milk as well as meat. In this regard, he said education programmes would be conducted for training of the farmers.—APP
