MULTAN, Oct 27: The Farmers Vision Forum has urged the provincial agriculture minister to declare the terms of reference for the committee formed to probe pesticides’ shortage.

Talking to Dawn, the forum’s chief executive, Khwaja Muhammad Shuaib, appreciated the minister’s move to hold an inquiry and determine how had the pesticides become extinct in the market at such a crucial stage when the economically pernicious American and army bollworms were playing havoc with the cotton crop.

Mr Shuaib said the inquiry committee should not restrict itself to the statements of officials of the Punjab agriculture department, because their version on the crisis was already known.

The agriculture minister has reportedly assigned the inquiry to the Punjab agriculture secretary, Arif Naveed, with directions that the report be submitted in two weeks.

He said the ‘premature’ awareness campaign launched by the agriculture department for cotton protection should also be scrutinized for its pros and cons.

He stressed that the inquiry committee should also give a hearing to growers’ organizations, independent farm scientists and other stakeholders to ascertain the actual causes of the crisis.

He said the growers could not meet the cost of production despite the high cotton-seed prices in the wake of a low per acre yield while the spinners were likely to face problems while marketing their products after buying high-priced cotton.

He said the Punjab agriculture department was blaming rains for the pest flare-up this year. As a matter of fact, the crop outlook up to the rainy months of July and August had been so encouraging that experts were hoping for a bumper crop.

He said the inquiry committee should also look into the complaints of substandard and adulterated pesticides and fix responsibility for the phenomenon both on the firms marketing such products as well as the government departments responsible for controlling quality of pesticides.