The fate of the 150,000 tonnes of Australian wheat bought by the Pakistan Agriculture Seed and Storage Corporation (Passco) under a Minfal plan to avert a looming wheat crisis and now lying at Port Qasim, continues to hang in the balance awaiting decision of the federal cabinet.
According to a report, Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali has been informed that the wheat imported from Australia, costing over $30 million, is infected with fungus as confirmed in a second test conducted at the National Agricultural Research Council (NARC), in the presence of Australian officials.
This followed the government's decision regarding the disputed wheat consignment in response to Australian authorities' demand for a retest after an earlier NARC report that karnal bunt fungus and low gluten content had been detected in the consignment.
The dispute had arisen over the refusal of Passco to accept the initial shipment unloaded at Port Qasim, but while the controversy was still brewing, more wheat had been discharged by four ships, representing the entire contracted supplies.
It will be recalled that the federal cabinet, in its meeting held on February 28, had deputed Professor Ata-ur-Rehman to personally supervise the re-examination of Australian wheat by NARC.
The committee, subsequently constituted by Professor Ata for re-examination under his supervision, included Dr Kausar Malik, Member, Bio Sciences, Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission; Dr Faqir Anjum, head of the Food Technology Department, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad; and Dr Iqbal Chaudhry, acting Director, HEJ Research Institute of Chemistry, University of Karachi, besides other scientists.
It is reported to have concluded that the disputed wheat, besides carrying karnal bunt fungus, fell short of the minimum requirements in its gluten content.
Moreover, it is said to have warned that use of this wheat would lead to spread of karnal bunt fungus on a large scale throughout the country with potential of damage to the agricultural land over a long time.
Whether or not the government decides to accept this huge quantity of the grain, the end of the controversy around the deal can hardly be expected to redeem the heavy loss in terms of money and the reputation of the country suffered in mishandling the transaction right from its very beginning.
For, as earlier pointed out in these columns, the whole effort seems to have backfired not only from the wrong timing of the import but also from non-release of the supplies thus obtained over a long period of time.
The ugly situation arising from the clearly questionable deal has acquired several unpleasant dimensions.
First and foremost, the arrival of supplies from far off Australia, well past the dreaded shortage from delayed harvesting of the Sindh crop, reduced it to a mere exercise in futility.
For, the persisting shortage of the grain in the meantime had resulted in hardship to the people due to unavoidable increase in the cost of wheat they can hardly afford to live without eating.
Again, the mundane moves, including populist overtures by the federal, provincial and district authorities, proved of little avail.
More to it, all this happening in a country having attained autarky after decades of devoted multi-directional effort could be viewed as being tantamount to making it a laughing stock among the wheat producing nations.
For one thing, it will be recalled that official forecasts had given quite an optimistic view of wheat production, the prospects of which appeared to have substantially improved by the recent rains, indicating an understandable urge to benefit from exports.
Naturally, as such, the situation as lately unfolding has given rise to serious misgivings about the handling of the wheat situation in the country.
And these include ideas of creation of artificial shortage too. Needless also to point out, the assignment of the task of wheat import to Passco had also been called into question.
All in all, the situation as eventually unfolding will be found to be nothing short of a dilemma for the government.
This, among other things, has reference to the pressure reportedly mounted by the Australian authorities. Perhaps, the best course for the government would be to opt for the lesser evil, that is to reject the Australian wheat under the circumstances which incidentally as reports indicate it has.
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