The crisis caused by scarcity and soaring prices of wheat and flour has literally caused a 'belly ache' for nearly every citizen. The irony that it happened to a wheat surplus country, in a year when the authorities announced a bumper crop and an 'exportable surplus' is even more excruciating.
The wisdom of allowing wheat export in sizeable quantities and then having to import many times that much soon thereafter at exorbitant prices strikes to most observers as a contrived move to fill some privileged coffers at the cost of rest of the country.
The province of Punjab has been the granary feeding the entire country - a role it inherited from the days before the partition of India when wheat from Punjab fed the population of the entire sub-continent. So how come, an area that grew enough wheat to suffice for 400 million at one time, cannot now meet the requirement of only 40% of that population?
THE PROBABLE CAUSES FOR THIS ANOMALY ARE MANY, BUT THE MOST IMPORTANT ARE:
a) Minfal and others involved cannot escape the blame for the bungling, and a thorough investigation is necessary to determine who is at fault for;
(i) Incorrect forecast of crop yield (ii) allowing export, (iii) inefficient procurement, storage and distribution, and (iv) uncontrolled smuggling to neighbouring and even remote countries, from some of whom we are now trying to import wheat to feed ourselves. It won't be a surprise if it transpires that we are buying back our own 'smuggled out' stocks at fancy prices now.
b) Authorities are now probably looking at various factors of production, and distribution like:
(i) acreage under wheat cultivation, (ii) inputs like seeds, fertilisers, pesticides and most importantly water, (iii) losses in storage and distribution, (iv) Inter provincial 'one-up-man-ship' and (v) illegal movement of the commodity in and outside the country, besides (vi) hoarding and profiteering by unscrupulous opportunists, and finally, losses to the exchequer.
ITEMS (III) AND (V) OF THE FOREGOING NEED SOME ELABORATION:
STORAGE: In most countries grain storage is carried out in silos, which facilitates movement of grains out of storage on a 'first in, first out' basis. Where this system is not followed, sacks of grain are piled one on top of the other.
The result is that the last bags 'in' are pulled 'out' first, and the earliest stocks remain buried for years under the pile to rot, get infested by rats and other pests, or simply rendered unfit for human consumption. Such waste is then auctioned off, purportedly for animal feed or other purposes.
However, in practice it has often been reported (particularly in the province of Sindh) that this type of condemned stocks are mixed with other wheat and supplied to flour mills, eventually causing unmentionable diseases and health problems for the hapless consumers.
Similar reports have emerged from time to time for other commodities like cotton too, but one shudders at the sheer inhuman bestiality of letting people die for the sake of illicit profits for a selected few, by mixing bad (old) and good (new) wheat.
And who knows the unscrupulous millers are not using the 'bad' wheat stocks in entirely and feeding the gullible public. This practice has to stop, no matter how infrequent or isolated the instances may be.
While on the subject it may be worth mentioning that qualified nutritionists and health inspectors must be deployed to exercise strict supervision and utmost vigilance to prevent any such untoward accident. Defaulters must be severely punished as an example to others. Any hint of official connivance at any level must be investigated and guilty parties brought to book.
SMUGGLING: The phenomenon is not new and has been in evidence even since independence. The eastern, northern and western borders of the country have always been a sieve through which the nefarious activities of all kinds of smugglers have gone through.
This includes food grains, merchandise, arms and drugs. Border security needs beefing up and subjected to spot checking to uncover any complacency or worse (connivance). Taking this matter lightly or denying its existence can only lead to other even worse tragedies.
What is surprising is the sheer audacity of the criminals who could manage to smuggle flour or wheat out of Pakistan to destinations as far as Russia. It is hard to believe such things happening without the knowledge or perhaps involvement of some bad eggs in the administration.
It is really sad indeed that the crisis has surfaced so soon after the tragic assassination of that champion of 'Roti, Kapra aur Makan'. Further, the assemblies are non-existent at present where questions could be raised, although, based on past and recent performance, it is doubtful if our MPAs and MNAs were really up to the tasks, or cognisant of their responsibility to their constituents!