LAHORE, Jan 7: A consultative meeting of civil society organisations, trade unions, peasant bodies and political parties will be held on Jan 11 to review preparations for the all-Pakistan Kissan Conference being held in the city on Feb 4.

A meeting of the Awami Jamhoori Tehreek (the left alliance) and organising body of Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee on Sunday discussed details of the conference.

The organisers say they are expecting 10,000 participants from allover the country. An application seeking permission from the city district government to hold the moot has been filed, they add.

They say the conference will discuss the worsening situation of peasantry in the country in the backdrop of strict implementation of WTO regime in agriculture sector, rising costs of farm inputs and a consistent withdrawal of state subsidies, resulting in growing poverty among peasants.

Rights activist Asma Jehangir, Abid Hasan Minto, and Rasool Bakhsh Palejo will be the main speakers at the moot, which will also announce institution of a national peasant body.

The conference will be the first peasant event in Lahore after the 1952 Kissan moot, which was chaired by late Shiekh Rashid.

The Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee was formed in 2003 at a peasant moot at Chishtian, Bahawalnagar, with a view to unite peasants at a progressive platform. It held another conference in Mirpur Khas, Sindh, in 2004. It helped one of its affiliate bodies, Pakistan Kissan Committee, in organising another Kissan Conference in 2005 at Toba Tek Singh. Thousands of peasants have participated in these activities.

Though PKRC is an apolitical independent peasant body, all the left-oriented parties are supporting it. A majority of radical social organisations have also lent their support for bringing all the progressive peasant bodies on a single platform. At present, such 22 organisations are part of the PKRC.

Meanwhile, according to the organisers, feudalism is being strengthened by the present military regime, and army and the feudal elements are major beneficiaries of the system. Over 12 per cent of the country’s agricultural land was now owned by military or military-related institutions, they claimed.

Privatisation of fertilizers companies, expensive electricity, import of expired pesticides, usage of genetically-modified seeds, intellectual property rights of crops and several other issues are now haunting the farming community, they deplore.

The conference will be an opportunity for participating peasants to exchange views and devise a strategy to fight back, paving the way for more collaboration among progressive peasant bodies, they say.