Farmers’ rights

The farmers’ protest taking place in Lahore represents the anger of the farmers at the current agricultural crisis in the country.  Held under the umbrella of the Pakistan Kissan Ittehad, the protest by Punjab’s farmers has not been short of ideas. Unfortunately, as has become usual in such cases, the electronic media could not look beyond a simplistic reading of the farmers’ protests – painting them as a public nuisance. It seems the media has been quick to forget that last year was one of the worst years for agriculture in the country’s history. Even during 2010 – the year of extreme floods – agricultural performance was better than what we have witnessed in the past few years. The government has shared the same view. The Pakistan Kissan Ittehad leadership claims that over 3,000 farmers were arrested before they could reach Lahore, which created a more volatile atmosphere at the actual venue.

The next stop for Punjab’s protesting farmers is Islamabad. Their demands are simple enough: declare an agricultural emergency for five years, declare support prices for five key crops, abolish agricultural income tax, announce a subsidy on fertilizer and pesticide, reduce the electricity tariff for tubewells and stop trading in agricultural goods with India. The federal and provincial governments have both failed to plan for the agricultural sector. The much promoted Prime Minister’s Kissan Package 2015-16 has been proven to be a failure. It is time to take the farmers own demands seriously. Agriculture has been the beating heart of Punjab’s economy for a century and a half. It is facing a fundamental threat due to the dangerous mix of increased input prices and cheaper foreign imports. With technological and seed upgrades, both much slower processes, the only way to make farming in the country competitive is to accept the farmers’ demands. Instead of treating the protesting farmers as a public nuisance, the government should have instead welcomed them to share their concerns, grievances and demands at a time when the agricultural sector has begun to shrink. The measures announced in Budget 2016-17 are clearly not going to be enough to spark an agricultural recovery. Although the protest ended after talks with the Punjab chief minister, the likelihood of their demands being ignored is still there. The only thing that is certain is that if the farmers are ignored now, the agricultural crisis in the country will only become worse.