LAHORE: Farmers’ representatives have expressed their disappointment with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s Kissan package saying it is aimed at benefiting the tractor and fertiliser factories instead of the farming community.

“Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is describing the package as historic. However, the reality is far from it as most of the steps taken in it are conventional. Under the guise of relief to farmers, real support has been given to tractor and fertiliser manufacturing factories in the form of subsidies and duty cut for import of tractor parts,” says Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee.

The relief package provides no money for education and training of farmers and also it mentions no subsidy for new agricultural machinery which is crucial to help farmers, PKRC leader Farooq Tariq says, adding instead, chemical fertilisers which are harmful to agriculture, have been promoted.

The permission to import five-year-old tractors is a practical joke as the imported machines are so expensive that only big landlords can afford them, he says. Ideally, the government should have invested in promoting local technology, he adds.

He says that a Rs30 billion subsidy is being given to the fertiliser factory owners besides the subsidised gas these factories are receiving. “It seems that the only segment benefitting from this package is the big factory owners.”

The only silver lining in the Kissan package is fixing of the power tariff at Rs3 per unit even though the demand by the farmer community was Rs8 per unit, Mr Tariq says.

About the interest-free loans, the PKRC leaders says it seems that only the solar loan is interest-free, all other loans will be interest-based, while the package is yet to explain whether it will be commercial level interest or not.

Commenting on the Rs5bn interest-free loans for landless women, he says instead of trapping the women farmers in the clutches of loans, they should have been given free agricultural land. “Landless farmers need agricultural land, not interest-free loans.”

It is also important to note that underground water levels have gone down in Punjab. The government needs to introduce scientific steps on how to address such challenges as water shortages will become common in near future, he warns.

He laments that the “agrarian reforms” introduced by this package are part of the neoliberal agenda, driven by the IMF and other financial and corporate sectors, emphasising on giving loans and not subsidies.

He suggests providing land to landless peasants to lay the groundwork for new agricultural development; one that is based on the principles of sustainable natural farms.

“Contrary to what the government has announced, we see that the demands of farmers are radically different. One of the important demands is that farmers whose lands were affected by the floods should be given immediate state assistance of at least Rs0.5 million each, while including the landless agricultural labourers in the aid cover. Sadly, such demands have been entirely ignored in the relief package.”

Published in Dawn, November 3rd, 2022