KHYBER: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Agriculture retired Major Mohammad Sajjad Khattak has said that provincial government is keen in devising a better strategy to enhance agricultural yield in tribal districts despite financial constraints.

Addressing the inauguration ceremony of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa rural investment and institutional support project and olive farming at Bara Agriculture Training Centre on Thursday, he said that modern tools and machinery were required for a rapid agricultural development but the provincial government faced shortage of required funds for the purpose.

He, however, said that provincial government desired to invest Rs40 billion in the seven merged districts for development of agricultural to provide additional financial benefits to tribal farmers. “Improving agriculture and assisting local farmers are the priorities of present provincial government with focus on introducing modern agricultural technology to facilitate local farmers,” he added.

The minister said that a draw was conducted on forms submitted by local farmers for walking tunnels, vertical farming and kitchen gardening under the assistance of World Bank. He congratulated those farmers, whose names were selected after the draw.

He said that the draw was conducted in a transparent manner. Later, he distributed olive plants among the selected farmers.

On the occasion, the director of agriculture, Ziaul Islam Dawar gave a detailed briefing about the activities of his department in different parts of Khyber in particular reference to grafting of thousands of wild olive trees in Tirah and other parts of Bara.

The ceremony was also attended by officials of provincial agriculture department along with MNA Iqbal Afridi and MPAs Abdul Ghani and Suhail Afridi.

A group of Bara farmers, however, later complained that they were neither invited to the ceremony nor they were included in the draw. They said that farmers from across the Khyber should be treated equally and provided with official assistance on equal basis.

Published in Dawn, July 5th, 2024