MIRPURKHAS, Sept 26: Local farmers have expressed concern over an increase of Rs100 in the price of a bag of the DAP fertilizer instead of reduction according to the agricultural package announced by President Gen Pervez Musharraf.

They called on the authorities to implement the package and take steps to decrease the price of the fertilizer. The demand was made at a meeting held here on Saturday to prepare a plan for cultivation of crops for Rabi season, including wheat.

The meeting was presided over by chairman of the Agriculture Monitoring Committee Ghulam Akbar Dars and attended by the officers of the agriculture and irrigation departments and Zarai Taraqiati Bank, representatives of pesticide and fertilizer companies and farmers.

Speaking at the meeting, Mohammad Umer Bohio and other farmers said that the president, in his agricultural package, had announced a reduction in the price of the DAP fertilizer by Rs100 per bag. However, they deplored, that the price had increased and a bag of the DAP was being sold at Rs840 in the market.

The regional manager of the ZTB told the meeting that the farmers having 25 acres were being granted a loan of Rs60,000 under one window operation. A representative of the director of the Nara Canal Area Water Board said that owing to water shortage, water would be supplied to the water channels originating from the Jamrao Canal only for a week in a month from October 1.

The farmers called on the provincial government to provide additional water to Mirpurkhas as crops were cultivated in the district earlier than other parts of Sindh.