KARACHI (March 16 2004): Sindh Food and Agriculture Minister Arif Mustafa Jatoi has said that flour prices would settle down at or around Rs 12 per kilogram by the end of March.

The minister was addressing a press conference at his office on Monday to explain reasons for the shortage of wheat and atta in the province and to give his assessment on the artificiality of the wheat and flour crisis.

He said that increase in the support price of wheat from Rs 300 to Rs 350 per 40 kilograms would cause an increase of about 17 percent in flour prices, which should be taken as normal.

The minister said that wheat procurement target set at 2.4 to 2.5 million tonnes would be achieved and there would be no shortage of wheat in Sindh and no further increase in prices would take place.

"Flour mills purchase wheat from open market, which affects the flour prices at the retail stage, but the government has no mechanism to check this situation," he said.

He said he saw rice crisis in the offing as the price increase pattern of daily use articles was alarming.

The minister said that it was bad luck of Sindh that the Federal government could not process wheat purchase deal from Australia in time. "We had intimated to the Federal government our concern in September and had asked them to make arrangement of wheat for Sindh. They did not finalise the matter quickly and slept over our request. Had they placed the order in time, they would have got enough time to check the quality of imported wheat at an appropriate moment and corrected the situation."

The minister said that from September 2003 to December 2003 there was enough time to avert crisis-like situation in Sindh.

"The expected arrival of 90,000 tons wheat from Australia did not materialise and brought misfortune to Sindh."

He said that expected arrivals in the remaining month of March (15 days) was 58,000 tonnes as 20,000 tonnes was already in stock. Passco would supply 10,000 tonnes, Punjab 20,000 tonnes and the World Food Programme has pledged 8,000 tonnes.

From this stock of 20,000 tonnes, Karachi region would get 6,000 tonnes, Hyderabad only 12 (twelve) tonnes, Sukkur 11,000 tonnes, Mirpurkhas region 1200 tonnes and Larkana 400 tonnes.

Regarding closure of a few mills in Upper Sindh, the minister said that the mill owners should keep the national interest above their petty personal interests. "However, I am sympathetic towards them and a few workers who are likely to suffer wage loss from this closure.
Courtesy Business Recorder