PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government is considering a proposal to give the people a food relief package worth Rs25 billion to Rs30 billion in the next budget.

Addressing a press conference here on Monday, Provincial Minister for Food Mohammad Atif Khan and Special Assistant to Chief Minister Barrister Mohammad Ali Saif said that the package would be the biggest one in the history of province.

Mr Khan said that Chief Minister Mahmood Khan was briefed about the proposed package, which would likely be announced in next budget. He said that the package would include pulses, flour, ghee and sugar and would cost Rs25 billion to Rs30 billion. He said that currently his department was working on developing a mechanism for the package to make it effective and corruption-free.

Regarding the situation of food prices in the province during Ramazan, the minister said that provincial government was providing a special relief package to people during the holy month. He said that government was striving to provide cheap flour to people in the holy month. He said that provincial government was providing flour to people at the cheapest rate as compared to other parts of the country.

Minister Atif Khan says govt striving to control prices

“A 20-kilogram bag of flour is available at Rs800 across the province,” he said, adding that the rate of the same bag in the rest of the country was more than Rs1,100. He said that government set up 127 sale points throughout the province. Supply of flour was also being ensured through trucks and other vehicles at various points in all districts, he added.

Mr Khan said that food department started providing 6,500 tonnes of flour on daily basis to people at the start of month; however, the figure now came down to 5,000 tonnes. “About six million bags of flour have been distributed after the start of Ramazan,” he added.

He said that price of tomato had gone up to Rs 280 per kilogram at the start of Ramazan; however, government ensured its import from Iran. “This has led to considerable decrease in the prices of tomato, which has come down to Rs80 per kilogram,” he added.

However, the minister said that at the same time when prices of most of the edibles were coming down, the rates of chicken and potato were a bit higher. “Food department is striving to bring the prices under control,” he added.

He said that government was also trying to control hoarding. He said that Pakistan turned into net importer from net exporter unfortunately. He said that the country had to increase the size of cultivable land and adopt new agricultural techniques to address the issue of higher prices of food items at the cost of billion of rupees in the long run. On the other hand, he said, the relief packages were short-term efforts to provide relief to people against the soaring prices.

Mr Khan said that wheat requirement of the province was more than 1.1 million tonnes, of which 100,000 tonnes were procured from Punjab, 500,000 tonnes were imported and the remaining 500,000 tonnes were purchased through Pakistan Agricultural Storage and Services Corporation.

Published in Dawn, April 19th, 2022