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Food Dept plans Rs 1.5b flour subsidy
LAHORE, April 30: The
Punjab Food Department has prepared a wheat
release policy that will subsidise the cost of
flour by Rs 1.5 billion. The policy is likely to
be announced next week, official sources told
Daily Times on Thursday.
The sources said the department might start
issuing wheat on September 15 this year, a month
earlier than last year, because senior officials
were confident the ongoing wheat-procurement
campaign would achieve and possibly surpass its
3.5 million metric tonne target.
The department will ask the Finance Department for
the cost of the wheat subsidy, which it has been
getting for the last 50 years with the exception
of 2003, the sources said.
A senior official said the Food Department most
years spent around Rs 1.5 billion on incidentals,
mostly interest payments on loans taken for wheat
procurement and transport and for storage and
delivery charges, which is why it would ask for a
Rs 1.5 billion subsidy from the Punjab government.
He said the decision to release wheat a month
early would help the department control costs to
the same level as last year.
Last year, the department included incidentals in
the procurement prices and supplied wheat after
gradually increasing prices from Rs 300 per 40kg
to Rs 350 per 40kg, the official said. “All the
burden was ultimately shifted to the consumer with
a view to providing better prices to farmers. This
year, the department has already fixed the price
of wheat at Rs 358.25 per maund (40kg) and the
consumer cannot possibly pay more, so the subsidy
is needed to keep prices in control,” he said.
The official said because Sindh and the NWFP had
not raised wheat or flour prices in 2003, the two
provinces would have to heavily subsidise the
commodities or see a hefty price raise this year.
He said today’s meeting of all provincial food
ministers in Islamabad on the wheat issue was
unofficially called by the NFWP food minister. He
said the Punjab would not lift the ban on
inter-district and inter-province wheat transport,
as Chief Minister Pervaiz Elahi had reitereated.
He said Punjab Food Minister Muhammad Iqbal would
stick to that position at the meeting and try to
explain to the other provinces that the ban
provides food security that would enable the
Punjab to help the other provinces meet their
wheat requirements.
Asked what effect the lifting of the ban would
have on the market, the official said it would not
be lifted completely but would be relaxed. He said
all checks would be maintained to stop the
hoarding of wheat.
Asked to comment on the meeting, Punjab Food
Secretary Shahid Hassan Raja said Punjab would
stick to its position that the ban cannot be
lifted until the wheat procurement target is met.
About the crackdown on wheat hoarders, he said the
Food Department was not arresting anyone, just
making sure that only authorised buyers were
purchasing wheat. He said no cases had been
registered against wheat-stockers in Punjab.
If someone was found hoarding wheat or illegally
transporting wheat, they would be asked to sell
the wheat to the Food Department or face
punishment. “However, everyone including farmers
and traders are cooperating so there have been no
arrests,” Mr Raja said.
Daily Times
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Pakissan.com; Advisory Point
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