PESHAWAR, Jan 5: In an effort to control the prices of flour, the NWFP government is increasing the supply of subsidised wheat, according to officials.

The NWFP food department had doubled the wheat quota for local flour mills, while the number of fair price shops in Peshawar was being increased from 30 to 60, Qazi Hifzur Rehman, NWFP’s food secretary, said at a press conference here on Saturday.

The news conference was attended, among others, by the District Coordination Officer for Peshawar, Abdur Rasheed.

The secretary claimed that the Frontier government had taken a number of measures to ensure the maximum availability of flour to the consumers at affordable rates. Mr Rehman said that the supply of wheat to local mills had been increased from 1,500 tons to 3,000 tons a day and mills had been directed to sell a 20-kg bag for Rs310 at officially designated fair price shops.

He said that the hike in the prices of flour was a country-wide phenomenon, which was expected to be controlled after the arrival of 1.5 million tons of imported wheat. According to him, the NWFP government would get 200,000 tons of the imported commodity, enabling it to make the supply situation better.

Mr Rehman said that Peshawar was being given preference and the distribution of 20-kg bags of subsidised flour was being increased from 18,000 bags to 20,000 bags a day at 60 fair price shops in the provincial capital.

The DCO conceded that in the post-devolution scenario the district administration had lost much of its regulatory powers.

The food secretary clarified that there was no ban on the movement of wheat and flour from Punjab, adding that flour being sold in the local markets was being brought from there.