Farmers leader demands fair prices as wheat policy awaited

Farmers representatives warned on Tuesday that the government's failure to announce a wheat policy as harvest approaches is creating uncertainty, and demanded that growers receive fair crop prices instead of subsidies.

According to ARY News, Pakistan Kisan Ittehad chairman Khalid Khokhar told reporters in Islamabad that wheat harvesting is near but the government has yet to unveil its policy for the crop. He said Punjab farmers have cultivated 16 percent more sugarcane this year and advised the government to keep sugar stocks for domestic consumption up to November and export the remaining quantity.

Khokhar questioned what would happen to farmers if sugarcane growers suffer losses. "We don't want subsidy but a legitimate and justified price of our crops," he said. He lamented that Pakistan is the only country in the world where sugarcane and wheat crops are subjects of politics.

Khokhar said the farmers' organisation has changed its mode of protest and does not need to hit the roads. "Farmers will reduce cultivation of their crops," he added.

Pakistan Kisan Ittehad is a national farmers' organisation that has long pressed for crop support prices and market access. The statement comes as wheat harvesting is about to begin, a crop that shapes rural incomes and food prices across Pakistan. The 16 percent increase in sugarcane cultivation cited by Khokhar covers Punjab, the country's largest agricultural province. Wheat and sugarcane support prices are announced by the federal government each year, and farm groups argue that delays in these announcements leave growers without a clear signal for sowing and marketing. Khokhar did not say when the government might announce the policy. The ARY report did not include a government response.

The Associated Press of Pakistan also published a photograph of farmers spraying pesticides on a rice crop with knapsack sprayers in a field on the outskirts of the city.