Wheat growers demand Rs4,000 per maund

The Sindh Chamber of Agriculture (SCA) has urged the provincial government to set the minimum support price for wheat at Rs4,000 per maund and officially procure 1.5 million metric tons of the staple commodity.

It rejected the construction of six new canals on Indus River and demanded that the federal government immediately shelve the project.

The body of Sindh growers fretted about the ongoing shortage of water at Sukkur Barrage and urged the federal government to ensure that the water gauges at Guddu, Sukkur and Kotri barrages were maintained according to the Indus River System Authority (IRSA) standards.

It expressed those views during a meeting held at the SCA headquarters in Hyderabad district. On the occasion, young farmer Syed Zainul Abidin Shah was elected president of the SCA.

SCA General Secretary Zahid Hussain Bhurgari, who is also a sustainable agricultural expert, raised concerns about the lack of certified heat-resistant cotton seeds in the market and called on Sindh government to take immediate action to make such seeds available.

He asked the government to set a minimum support price of Rs12,000 per maund for cotton to encourage farmers to meet production targets. SCA Patron-in-Chief Dr Syed Nadeem Qamar said the construction of new canals on Indus River would completely destroy Sindh’s agriculture, taking a heavy toll on the country’s overall agricultural economy. He said Sindh’s agriculture had fallen into a decline and the construction of canals would lead to water shortage, which would further ruin the agriculture sector.