After a two-year gap, Sindh has produced an impressive wheat crop of 4.3 million tonnes, according to the agriculture department’s official second estimate. The province achieved a 4.2m tonnes production mark over a decade ago in 2010-11, followed by 4m tonnes two years later in 2013-14 and 2020-21.

Given the countrywide bumper wheat crop, the federal government is now advising provinces to revise procurement targets upwards with an enhanced support price. Sindh had set a 900,000-tonne procurement target with a support price of Rs4,000 per 40kg, but it has yet to confirm if it is revising procurement figures as per federal advice.

Sindh contributes around 13 per cent to 14pc in regional and 14.7pc in national wheat production, while Punjab is a major producer of the staple crop with a 74pc contribution in annual production. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan contribute the rest of the 12pc.

The average yield in Sindh has been recorded at 3,288kg or 32.9 maunds per acre. Increased acreage this year has led to an impressive production. After a 4m tonne production in 2013-14, Sindh failed to hit the mark in subsequent years until 2020-21, when it performed better. In these past seven years, production has varied between 3.8m tonnes to 3.9m tonnes.

According to the agriculture department’s figures, Sindh achieved 1,380,162 hectares in 2023-24, an 11.46pc increase compared with 1,238,227 hectares in 2022-23. Similarly, the province achieved 4.3m tonnes of production — a 10.7pc increase compared to the 3.9 m tonnes last year — though per hectare yields declined by 0.7pc if we compare 2023-24’s 3,159kg with last year’s 3,182kg.

Wheat procurement has already begun, but market prices have plummeted considerably to Rs3,200 per 40kg from Rs3,700 per 40kg at the commencement of the harvesting season. The Sindh food department had procured 90,000 metric tonnes — 10pc of the target by the first week of April. Procurement usually begins in April, however it was commenced earlier amidst farmers’ demands to start by March due to the early sowing trends of Kharif crops.

According to Sindh food officials, a smaller procurement target is fixed given 500,000 tonnes of wheat availability. Crops are purchased with government funds only to benefit small and medium-size farmers, who can get a support price for their produce and ensure stability in the market through government intervention.

But, the procurement exercise remains purposely marred by irregularities. It hardly serves the cause of small and medium farmers who were otherwise the government’s focus in its usual claims ahead of every crop season.

For instance, devastations caused by rainfall in Sindh forced the government to raise wheat procurement support price from Rs2,200 per 40kg in 2021-22 to Rs4,000 per 40kg in 2022-23 to make up for losses borne by small farmers in flood-hit areas. However, the Sindh government has kept support price unchanged for 2023-24 despite farmers calling for an enhancement to commensurate increasing costs of inputs, especially high electricity tariff.

“In fact, this government procurement job is not just flawed; it is purely mala fide, which actually makes Sindh suffer. Now, there is talk of increasing province procurement targets. It will primarily benefit those vested interests that are already exploiting farmers. Farmers don’t get the benefit of the official wheat support price,” says Sindh Abadgar Board (SAB) president Mahmood Nawaz Shah.

He believes 50pc to 60pc crops have already been sold or missed by food officials for procurement, and they would now be purchased directly from traders/middlemen. “Nobody is willing to correct this process,” he laments.

The Sindh government had announced wheat procurement in consultation with farmers’ bodies, ie inclusion of growers’ representatives, for the distribution of Bardana (gunny bags) to farmers to enable them to bring crops to food godowns and get support prices.

For farmers, selling grain to the food department is a cumbersome exercise that frustrates them at many levels, so much so that they end up selling their produce in open markets or to middlemen for a lower price instead of shunting from one official to another.

“Even after selling hay of wheat crop, we are getting Rs3,500 per 40kg as the market offers Rs3,200 per 40kg rate,” says Zubair Talpur, president of Sindh Abadgar Ittehad (SAI). According to him, growers remain dependent on market forces. “Sindh has a bumper crop, and Punjab is coming up with a bumper crop, too. We have reports that more consignments of imported wheat are to arrive,” argues Mr Talpur.

The Food department has been regularly failing in meeting procurement targets. It was six years back when the department had met a 1.4m tonnes target. Financial embezzlement and criminal proceedings have instituted against officials.

It is either influential farmers who get gunny bags and sell crops to the government or the food official-trader nexus that stomachs the price differential (amount between the official support price of Rs4,000 per 40kg and the market rate around Rs3,200 per 40kg currently). Neither farmers, by and large, get support prices nor consumers get flour at an inexpensive rate — the government’s attempts to control retail flour price notwithstanding.

Like grain producers who feel exploited in procurement exercises, Chakki owners remain crying hoarse against the wheat release policy of food department. These Chakkis cater to the flour intake needs of mainly urbanised consumers as the rural population mostly preserves the crop till it is needed.

A look at the 2022-23 wheat release policy tells a different story. The Sindh food department decided to release 65,636.2 tonnes of residual wheat procured in the 2021-22 season for as high a price as Rs8,500 per 100kg bag or Rs3,400per 40kg under per the Feb 21, 2023 notification of food department. This wheat was procured in 2021-22 for Rs5,500 per 100kg or Rs2,200 per 40kg from growers.

The department found that 69,2449.9m tonnes of wheat stocks, including 41,444.9m tonnes from Karachi, were allocated for releases under a liberal policy at Rs8,500 per 100kg against the carrying cost of Rs7,874 per 100kg.

Of such stocks, 32,730.6m tonnes were lifted and later, according to a July 17, 2023 departmental review, had put damaged wheat stocks at 46,499m tonnes inclusive of 33,893m tonnes after release, indicating an increase of 12,605.7m tonnes in stocks.

Food officials attribute it to market dynamics. According to them, wheat was initially released for Rs5,825 per 100kg from October 2022 to January 2023 and then in view of increased price trends, the department revised the release price to Rs8,500 per 100kg from January 2023 onward thus earning a substantial sum to cover losses of government.

It looks as if consumers feature nowhere in the entire scene and are destined to buy expensive flour even if wheat is procured for a lower price from grain producers.

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, April 22nd, 2024