While the cotton-picking season is not far from its end in Sindh, the Trading Corporation of Pakistan has yet to lift lint cotton from ginning factories.
It has been over a month since the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) had announced procurement of 1m bales from cotton ginners to stabilise prices, while approving the support price of Rs3,000 for seed cotton.
However, procurement centres have not opened yet to lift cotton bales from ginners, though reports indicate that they are to be set up in Sukkur, Nawabshah and Mirpurkhas districts.
The Trading Corporation of Pakistan is now busy finalising modalities to lift lint cotton from ginning factories. A meeting between TCP officials and ginners was held last Thursday. The TCP administration indicated it would buy 600 bales from each factory against the demand of 20,000 bales by Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association.
A former PCGA chairman for Sindh Ramesh Lal said the TCP is moving cautiously because of its past experience and the early crop growers of lower Sindh will not benefit from the delayed decision. Only farmers of upper Sindh and Punjab will get the advantage of support price.
