Arab countries, MNCs: serious concern voiced against six million acres land offer

Sustainable Agriculture Action Group (SAAG) network of civil society and farmers' organisations across the country have expressed serious concern over government's decision to offer six million acres of land to Arab countries and multinational companies (MNCs).
Representatives of SAAG and farmers, addressing a press conference here at National Press Club on Friday lamented that 77 million Pakistani people were food insecure and the government, instead of allocating cultivatable agricultural lands to local landless peasants, was going to hand over to foreigners and multinational companies.
Stressing the need for starting uplift project for the rural poor in order to promote and increase farm production, they said that the government should distribute the farm land among the local landless farmers.
They said that Pakistan is an agrarian country and 67 percent of its populations is directly or indirectly linked to agriculture. Agriculture accounts for one-fourth of GDP and it provides employment to 44 percent of population. However, despite being an agrarian country, Pakistan has been declared net food importing country by World Trade Organisation (WTO).
Despite serious reservation of farmers' community and civil society, previous government approved Corporate Agriculture Farming (CAF) policy. The present government pushed the policy step ahead and announced to offer six million acres land to resourceful countries and multinational companies (MNCs).
"Agriculture experts are warning of far-reaching adverse consequences of such polices and raising questions, when majority households are landless and poverty is rampant. Why is the government leasing land to rich Arab countries and to MNCs? On the other hand, India is grabbing land in African countries to meet its food security needs".
Civil society and farmers' community expressed fear that they would be further marginalised in the wake of corporate farming, keeping in mind the example of African countries where MNCs expanded their land and rendered many farmer communities landless.