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Growing olive trees
EDITORIAL (November 28 2002) : One of Pakistan's major imports being edible oil, the need to increase the production of this commodity locally cannot be over-emphasised.
And what better source of getting edible oil than olive, popular for its healthy, cholesterol-free qualities? So it looked like a great idea when sometime ago the Federal Government designed a multi-million olive cultivation project, which was to help the country reduce its oil import bill.
The project was started after experts had said that the soil and weather conditions in parts of the Frontier and Balochistan provinces as also the Pothohar region of Punjab were favourable to olive farming.
As per the plan, the government was to cultivate four million olive trees over the next seven years. Additionally, the olive trees growing in the wild in many areas of the Frontier and Balochistan provinces were to be converted into oil yielding varieties.
Grafting material for the purpose was to be brought in from Afghanistan, which the Pakistani agricultural experts had earlier helped in growing good quality olive trees. The grafting of the wild olives, of course, was to ensure that the fruit bearing process would be expedited.
The country is already reported to be producing a substantial quantity of olive oil. And if things went as planned, it was estimated, in about two years' time the country would not only be able to meet its own oil requirements but would also be able to export it.
Those involved were eyeing some Far Eastern countries as potential markets since, they calculated, olive oil produced in Pakistan would be cheaper than that these countries imported from some European nations. But that dream, it seems, is about to be shattered.
The Ministry of Food and Agriculture is said to be unwilling to release the required funds that were to be utilised for the cultivation of plants in the high rainfall areas of the three provinces. According to the project's director, the government had originally earmarked Rs 40 million for the current fiscal year.
The concerned ministry later revised that figure to bring it all the way down to Rs 5 million. Now even that amount has been further reduced to Rs 2 million only, jeopardising the entire endeavour.
That raises the obvious question, why did the Ministry of Food and Agriculture agree in the first place to provide that much money if it did not have the resources to meet even one-eighth of the cost it had originally agreed to provide for the project? The problem seems to be an outcome of our officialdom's usual inability to set the right priorities.
It is ironic indeed that this should happen despite the fact that the government has been laying a lot of emphasis on the development of the agriculture sector.
If the original financial cost for the current fiscal was determined at Rs 40 million, those working on the project cannot be expected to make do with merely Rs 2 million. The government must fulfil its commitment and provide the necessary funds. One way of overcoming the funds problem can be to attract private investments for the project.
Needless to say, that will require some really strong incentives. But then it is also true that sooner or later, the private sector is expected to get some incentives to step into the field. It would be more beneficial to do that at the present stage when the project needs to use all the support it can get.
Source: Business Recorder
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Pakissan.com;
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