Sindh ramps up efforts to achieve farm sector sustainability.

Byline: Mohammad Hussain Khan

GROWTH in the agriculture sector needs to be sustainable for a better performance. Sindh seems to be inching towards achieving goals for sustainability in the farm sector. However, the process remains slow even after the devolution of power to provinces under the 18th Amendment.

Sindh's agriculture policy, which aims to achieve a growth rate of four per cent, realises this aspect by conceding that the 'agriculture sector in Sindh, including livestock and fisheries, has not performed to its potential'.

Considering the farm sector's importance for the economy, even the UN's 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) tend to focus on the agriculture sector. While two SDGs relating to poverty and climate action are connected with farm sector indirectly, SDG-3 directly addresses issues pertaining to agriculture.

SDG-3 calls for promoting sustainable agriculture. Its four targets underscore the need for an 'increased investment in agriculture research and extension services to enhance agriculture productivity', 'double agricultural productivity and incomes of small-scale food producers', 'implement resilient agricultural practices', and 'maintain the genetic diversity of seeds'.

The goals can be achieved by providing a well-defined mechanism amid strong institutional oversight and regulatory framework to ensure better per-acre productivity within available water resources. Water availability being essential input of small farmers often gets undermined due to inter-provincial water issues or internal mismanagement in distributing available flows.

PPP mainly gets its electoral strength from rural population that is linked with the agriculture sector. But many of its promises related to the sector remain largely on paper

Pakistan Peoples Party mainly gets its electoral strength from rural population that is linked with the agricultural sector. PPP is in power for over 11 years (2008-2019) in Sindh and has been coming up with ambitious agriculture programmes in last three election manifestos.

But commitments like 'improving productivity', 'special programmes for farmers to reduce risks faced by them', 'announce an agriculture policy at beginning of every year' and 'fixing support price of wheat, rice, sugarcane and cotton' made in the 2008 and 2013 manifestos remain largely on paper.

Except for wheat, farmers have been facing difficulties when it comes to paddy and cotton support prices. They are exploited by rice millers...