QUETTA: Balochistan’s future is linked with developing and utilising natural resources and paying attention to boosting the livestock and fisheries sectors, and negligence towards these areas will put brakes on the province’s progress.

This was stated by Balochistan Chief Minister Jam Kamal Khan Alyani on Friday while speaking at a seminar organised by the livestock department in connection with the World Animal Day.

Adviser to the Chief Minister for Livestock Department Mitha Khan Kakar, environmental experts and officials of the department concerned also spoke on the importance of livestock and its promotion in the province.

“The economic growth of the province is badly affected as previous governments did not pay due attention to these three vital sectors,” Mr Alyani said.

He said that Balochistan was not only the biggest province as far as the area was concerned, but it was also the biggest province in terms of livestock as the province has 48 per cent sheep, 42 per cent camels and 30 per cent goats, but still the provincial livestock department had been facing crisis.

He said the present government had started its earnest efforts to provide maximum facilitate to the people linked with the livestock sector by providing them with modern machinery, installing digital meat processors and packaging machinery.

“We can be a major exporter of meat to south Punjab and Gulf countries by promoting livestock sector as it will give a boost to the provincial economy,” Mr Alyani said.

Referring to fast depleting water level in the province, the chief minister said that it was major problem and decreasing water level was a major cause of devastation of the livestock sector in the province.

He appealed to international donor agencies to provide help for reviving the livestock sector in the province.

He said the government could not provide jobs to the jobless youth of the province unless provincial agriculture and livestock sectors were developed on modern lines.

Published in Dawn, October 6th, 2018