"Pakistan is not on track in reaching the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) as food insecurity is still a critical problem here", Dominique Frankefort, Deputy Country Director of World Food Program (WFP), said while addressing a conference on 'Agricultural Policy and Food Security in a Decentralised Economy' here on Tuesday.
He said that National Food Security Survey is going on in Pakistan, and its results would be finalised soon. Dominique said that the issue of food insecurity in Pakistan is increasing gradually. Dr Munir Ahmad, Director, Food Security Centre, said that food security and economic growth mutually interact and reinforce each other in the development process. Food security is thus fundamental to national security.
He said that Pakistan has made significant improvement in aggregate food supply. Yet, poverty, malnutrition, and 'hidden hunger' are pervasive highlighting mismanagement in maintaining stability in nutritious food supply and its distribution. The dependence of urban poor on food markets is very well known and documented, while reliance of most of the rural food insecure among landless, marginal and small sized farmers' classes is rarely acknowledged. Over 60 percent of the rural population is either partially or totally dependent on market for food needs.
"Unfortunately, government efforts in providing relief to consumers and the subsidy are rarely meant for these rural households. Moreover, the access to factors affecting the biological food absorption in food insecure rural areas is even overwhelmingly shocking", Dr Ahmed said. Other participants included Abdul Kadir Khanzada, Chairman of Standing Committee on Science and Technology, and Mubarik Ali, CEO of Pakistan Agriculture Research Board (PARB), Lahore.
The participants said that managing food security requires linkages from macro to micro and necessitates close co-ordination between federal government, provincial governments and lower levels of governments. In the past, many countries including developing nations in Asia had started a move towards decentralised agriculture, and Pakistan was no exception to it. Potential benefits of decentralisation are very clear, and include: 1) greater overall responsiveness of government; 2) provision of government services according to local needs; 3) more effectively support and utilise the local economy, and 4) bringing the government closer to people.
They emphasised that decentralisation may create several conflicts of interests and carries certain risks, which further intensify when government policies, programs and decisions about resource allocations are decentralised, particularly when a country faces financial crisis and regional developmental inequalities. These include low level of technical and administrative capacity in various provinces may create unfavourable consequences for policy making and implementation. The participants said that the government has to identify appropriate levels of decentralisation or devolution for agricultural functions that would lead to higher level of efficiency in agriculture operations. Public functions of strategic relevance, such as overall food policy, security and safety, biosafety, trade and commerce, natural disaster management, safety nets, international and inter provincial co-ordination, and monitoring disease epidemics and surveillance, should remain as federal responsibilities. Nevertheless, their implementation requires substantial administrative capacity at the lower tiers which actually are responsible for implementing the policies.
The participants said that though the decentralisation of agricultural research is more appropriate at the agro ecological zones rather than administrative (provincial) levels for efficiency gains, the agricultural research institutions at the federal level cannot be absolved of the responsibility of conducting basic research, co-ordination, priority setting and policy development for agriculture research in the country. Research infrastructure under the control of federal government needs to be rationalised, they added.
Pursuing the agriculture for development agenda requires selecting the appropriate mix of policy instruments that would help reduce poverty and ensure food security. Evidence-based policy making, which involves rigorous research and solid monitoring and evaluation, can facilitate this process, which is the missing ingredient in Pakistan's policy making.
The participants said that the demand for decentralisation is not new in Asian countries. It is now sought in nearly all developing Asia including Pakistan, but the process is nowhere complete anywhere. Pakistan should learn from experience of other countries as well as own actions already taken in agricultural extension system.
Dr Shakil Ahmad Khan,from Ministry of Agriculture highlighted the importance of taking on board the provincial governments in setting up tasks on prices and production of various crops, while regulatory functions should remain in federal domain for better monitoring, thus ensuring food security in the provinces.
Dr Mubarik Ali said that it was high time to think about the implication of devolution of agricultural ministry. Food security is not only a policy issue but modern technology, dynamic research institutes are also prerequisites to meet international standards and supply and demand through need based and efficiently implemented policies. He said that the ministry of food and agriculture does not have any mission statement and no policy document approved by the cabinet is available.
Dr Khanzada emphasised that all political forces were taken on board on the 18th Amendment and all stakeholders were committed to the process of devolution. He pointed out that the issue of food security and research and technology in agriculture should remain a federal affair. He further highlighted the finances available to the provinces and the collaboration with the international agencies to be critical elements in the process of devolution.
Representing FAO, Dr David Doolan cautioned that the government should devolve the task along with authority, and the authority comes with resources. The federal government should take responsibility of food security while a strong need for collaboration in policies and research is required. He said that food security is not a production issues: it is the access to food for all people to lead a healthy life.
Dr Dominique pointed out that about 48 percent of the population is food-insecure and further 22 percent population was 'extremely food-insecure'. The recent survey in Sindh indicates alarming levels of severe and moderate malnutrition under the five-year age children. Under the devolved structure, provinces with weak agricultural research infrastructure will not have the human capital to develop optimum provincial strategies for agricultural development and food security.
The session ended on a high note by Dr Rashid Amjad, VC, PIDE, who thanked the panellists for their input and said that despite the fact that the supply of food has increased over time in South Asia, poverty, malnutrition and hunger are on the rise, thus pointing towards some fundamental weaknesses in policy making.
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