In its third quarter report, the State Bank of Pakistan maintained that minor crops suffered a 3.5pc decline during the reported time, hobbling agricultural growth to 2.1pc against the targeted 2.9pc.
The minor crops, according to it, had shown a growth of 6.5pc in the previous year, but went down by 3.5pc — a cumulative loss of around 10pc within a span of one year. If pulses production, normally considered part of a poor man’s diet, can go down so steeply in a year, there is hardly any way to save the poor from malnutrition.
Those, who are mandated to create that policy environment, do not simply seem interested in such an exercise. Punjab has written twice to the federal government in the last one year to create ‘ national missions, for pulses and vegetables. The federation is yet to even acknowledge those letters, let alone respond to the suggestion.
Farmers are switching over to major crops. According to the central bank report for the third quarter FY14, major crops grew by 3.7pc, while minor crops declined by 3.5pc. All subsidies, which had mainly been supporting minor crops, have been withdrawn over the years
