KARACHI: Former chairman of the standing committee on agriculture of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI), Ahmad Jawad, has demanded of the Ministry of Railways to introduce refrigerated freight cars to facilitate export of the Kinnow. The railways should also run a "Kisan Express" between Bhalwal, Sargodha and Karachi offering competitive freight rates.

He said the Kinnow rates for the farmer would be around Rs1,000 per maund subject to quality. This year around $220 million was expected to be earned from kinnow exports. Jawad said Pakistan remained unable to exploit the demand on the international markets due to the coronavirus pandemic for the citrus fruit containing vitamin C.

It was ironic that Punjab, the hub of kinnow production, could not draw the provincial government's attention towards the problems, while the federal government also continued ignoring the longstanding issues being faced by the kinnow industry, he said.

As per the documents, Pakistan's kinnow industry is worth around Rs125 billion. The entire economy of Bhalwal and Sargodha depends on this industry while about 250 processing factories located in the Punjab are providing direct employment to 2.5 million people.

He said that during the kinnow season shipping companies fall short of refrigerated containers while some private containers of shipping companies lacked adequate refrigeration facilities which spoilt the fruit by the time it was shipped from the port.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020