HYDERABAD, Oct 18: The Sindh agriculture department has established a WTO Cell in Karachi for creating awareness among farmers and entrepreneurs about effects of the WTO regime on the agriculture sector.
According to a notification, the terms of reference of the cell include gathering of the latest information about TRIPS (Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights), TRIMS (Trade Related Investment Measures), Agreement of Agriculture and agro-based environment and dissemination of information to farmers and other related organizations.
A spokesman for the directorate of agriculture information in a statement issued here on Tuesday said the cell would evaluate impact of different agreements and legislations relating to the WTO on provincial agriculture sector and devise measures to make the provincial government compatible with the requirements.
He said the cell would exchange ideas and identify initiatives to be adopted by the provincial government for development and growth of agricultural economy and welfare of farmers in the wake of challenges and opportunities of the WTO.
It will also liaise between federal, provincial and district governments as well as all other stakeholders on the WTO policy issues relating to the agriculture sector, he added.
SAF: The president of the Sindh Agriculture Forum, Mr Noor Ahmed Nizamani, has called for participation of farmers in agricultural policy-making.
He said that recent decision of introducing the drip irrigation system and providing laser land-levelers at subsidized rates might not be of much benefit to farmers.
In a press statement issued here on Monday, he said the tubes and emitter plugs might be provided to farmers at subsidized rates but to guard them in fields was a nightmare as the system was prone to vandalism.
He said the laser land-levelers might be provided at the lower cost but to operate them efficiently was not an easy job.
He said that there was need of trained experts to operate the system and there were not many of them in Sindh.
Mr Nizamani said both systems had been around for quite some time but were not popular among farmers.
He said when framing agricultural policies and preparing projects to support farmers, common sense remains unemployed.
He cited the example of the crop maximization project with an allocation of Rs500 million that was launched by the federal ministry of food agriculture and livestock in four provinces about two years ago.
Four districts of Sindh—Hyderabad, Sanghar, Nawabshah and Larkana — were selected and in each district farmers from seven villages were to participate.
He said the project was designed on the NGO pattern but had to be run by the bureaucracy and the man who prepared the project was federal commissioner for special crops and he was also given the charge of federal coordinator.
“There are funds for conferences, seminars and field days, for machinery and even equipment is purchased for office and provision is made for electricity but the entire exercise is described as hot and cold in bureaucratic jargon,” he said.
He said that the project totally failed and the money was wasted.
Mr Nizamani said wheat-sowing in Sindh would be in full swing within one month and what farmers needed now was seed graders so that they could clean their stored wheat seed and separate weeds from it.
He said that over one third of wheat crop grown in Sindh contains weeds and farmers suffer heavy losses in grain production.
He said that the best way to help farmers to increase agricultural production was to provide subsidies on crop inputs like seed fertilizer and diesel.
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