November 19, 2007	Monday	Ziqa’ad 08, 1428

MUZAFFARGARH, Nov 18: Traders and factory owners are reportedly conniving to pay low price for cotton to the farmers in the district as growers’ bodies are virtually non-existent here.

It has been learnt that in the beginning of the picking season, the cotton price was around Rs1,250 per 40 kg, but later with the stock market fluctuations it increased considerably.

However, all the 17 cotton factories in the district determine the crop price in connivance with trader mafia to the detriment of helpless farmers.

Local farmers deplore that in the absence of any official monitoring of cotton buying it was being bought at different rates in the district according to the whims of the mafia comprising traders and factory owners.

They said at factories the rate was Rs1,670 to 1,690 per 40 kg, but the traders were paying the farmers Rs1,500 to 1,540 for 40 kilograms.

They also lamented that there was no farmers’ association operative in the district to save the cotton growers from exploitative nexus of traders and factory owners.

Explaining the vicious circle, sources said the traders usually got interest-free loans from factory owners which made it binding for them to sell cotton only to the moneylender.

These traders, they added, invested the borrowed money in fertilisers and pesticides, earning huge profits through selling these items to farmers on interest, who usually paid the amount after they sold the crop to the trader. In return for the `favour’ the farmers are expected to sell the crop at a price which suits the trader.

A trader, requesting anonymity, told Dawn that he got Rs1 million loan from a cotton factory six months ago at the beginning of cotton season and bought fertilisers and pesticides which he sold to farmers on credit. Now, he claimed, it was his right to buy cotton from those farmers at the price of his choice (and supply it to the cotton factory which was at the upper end of the exploitative chain).

He said if any farmer complained against him to any official, he would not `help’ him next time.

Ghazi Ghat UC Nazim Nasir Almani and Wan Pittafi UC Nazim Iqbal Pitafi said the government should appoint teams to monitor cotton buying and to save farmers from exploitation.

A trader held the factory owners responsible for the exploitation, alleging they forced the traders to buy cotton at low rates.

Agriculture DO Jamshed Sindu said it was not his job to check the practice, and the government should appoint monitoring teams for the purpose. He said such teams had been appointed by former chief minister Mian Shehbaz Sharif