Bilawal for early disbursement of seed compensation to growers.

KARACHI -- Foreign Minister and Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Monday directed the Sindh government to start disbursement of cash for the seed the growers have purchased to grow the Rabi crop across the board within the next 20 days.

'The flood/rain has already caused huge loss to the growers and now they prepared their lands for Rabi crops; therefore, they must be supported to meet the requirement of their agricultural inputs,' Bilawal said this while presiding over a meeting at CM House here.

The meeting was attended by Sindh Chief Minister (CM) Syed Murad Ali Shah, provincial ministers Sharjeel Memon, Saeed Ghani, Nasir Shah, Mukesh Chawla, Administrator Karachi Barrister Murtaza Wahab, Chief Secretary Sohail Rajput, Chairman P and D Hassan Naqvi, PSCM Fayaz Jatoi, and Secretaries of different department.

The chairman PPP was told that the standing crops over an area of 3.6 million acres had been damaged in the recent flood which caused an Rs421 billion loss to the growers. Syed Murad Ali Shah said that to provide relief to farmers, it was decided to provide free inputs to the farmers. 'As a first step, an exercise is underway to compensate the farmers for wheat seed through cash transfers,' he said and added that Rs5,000 would be given per acre.

The CM said that his government had provided Rs8.39 billion; the federal government pledged to contribute Rs4.7 billion. He added that the total requirement for the purpose was Rs13.5 billion.

To a question, the CM told the chairman that the provision of subsidy on fertilizer was going to be worked out once the funding commitments from the federal government were made. He added that Rs46 billion were required for this intervention.

The CM told that the World Bank was supporting the farmers holding land up to 25 acres. At this, the PPP chairman directed the CM to give compensation for wheat seed to all farmers across the board regardless of the size of their landholding.

CM Advisor Manzoor Wassan told the meeting that wheat was sown over an area of 2.43 million acres.

Syed Murad Ali Shah said that Rs45.51 billion would be required if fertilizer was given to the growers. He added that DAP and Urea for wheat would cost Rs39.48 billion, the seed for oil crops Rs1.85 billion, and fertilizer (DAP and Urea) for oil seed crops Rs41.8 billion.

The chairman formed a committee under Manzoor Wassan with Sharjeel Memon, and Syed Nasir Shah to collect and verify the data of...