Dr Zafar Altaf Pakistan's prescriptive analysis needs to be rechecked. We have a serious problem where we may have theoretician [or pseudo ones] without any field experiences. Suffering as we are from any and multiple kinds of inferiority complexes the requirement is for a more wholesome experiential knowledge to counter the growing implications of many intended and unintended consequences to and in our economy. It is a travesty of thought that we think that there is no impact of various policies that we have brought into play. Take any reforms be it of the FBR; countless but we still take the WB loans and go our merry way. There is virtually no impact of the loans or the training that was imparted as a result. All these loans and so called help that we get as to what to do is counterproductive.
The current government's problem is that there are too many cooks. The broth is not spoilt but is virtually drained off and dried. The media is no better off and the media now portrays arrogance once reminiscent of the civil service of Pakistan. Once this arrogance converts into conceit one has the makings of a psychotic individual. In such a situation the personality assumes an ability to opine on anything and to take it as gospel truth. The facts are wrong and therefore, ipso facto, the analysis will be faulty. When opinion clashes take place between various factions the result is noise and the louder it is the weaker the opinions. Loud voices emerge when even the opinions are weak. Inflation and rising food prices have been under scrutiny.
The traditional form of agriculture is now obsolete. One cannot make a lame horse to run. Punjab is a lame horse in agriculture. It is marred by obsolete knowledge and primordial interventions. There was loud song and dance about tunnel technology and off season farming. Where has it been buried? That technology wasted a lot of time and resources of the government of Punjab. Where are all the financial resources that were given to biotechnology? Where are those people who argued with me in front of General Khalid the then governor of Punjab when I stated that this is a non-starter in Pakistan? National Institute of Biotechnology and Genetics Engineering (NIBGE) was created in 1983. They have wasted a considerable amount of resources.
Food inflation will not go away by wishing it to be so. The present Finance Minister (FM) is seriously involved in trying to solve this problem. It will not go away despite all his efforts. Roughly 4 to 5 million hectares have gone into urbanisation and this was all prime agriculture lands supplying vegetables to the cities that were near them. No longer as that and has been usurped by the land mafia. All Pakistani policymakers go to China but they rarely understand the social policies that China determines for its citizens. Pakistan does not have to follow them mutatis mutandis but innovate and adapt. Who will do that? Not the current lot of policy makers and their economic advisors.
The fact that the FM oil prices have been partly responsible [not wholly] is correct but then what about the other aspects. If oil has increased transaction costs is it not imperative to work differently? With the vegetables coming from different areas due to growing requirements what can be done? Well for one activate the agriculture research system to deliver instead of taking junk tours abroad and not travel to the hinterland because they find it too inconvenient?
For another can we not take the agriculture markets nearer to the growers so that what they have produced is sold? Non-existence of agriculture markets is one of the externalities that are a constraint to productivity. The advantage of this would also be that the employment would be generated. But when one has not missed a meal one cannot understand the dilemma of the poor. Why and how should small farmers sell their surpluses when the markets are more than 100 miles away or more? Balochistan and the Seraiki belt is the hardest hit. The periphery in Pakistan does not have the right to live - they are of a lesser God.
Why has Pakistan given FTA status to India without insisting on some basic requirements like how to pack and how to provide quality commodities? Why do these kitchen items come in third-rate gunny sacks? Why has our great PhD's in agriculture (whose education is paid for by the taxpayers of Pakistan) not delivered to the nation? Serious questions can be determined by the political government through a management and a financial audit? These questions will have to be answered sooner or later and no one can get away with it. Why have new research questions not determined? Why have the assets of this country given to other international agencies without seeking permission of the government? What has been achieved with their presence over there or is it a case of seeking benefits from them?
Inflation will only go away when the inland research carried out will improve productivity. Growth is stagnant in agriculture. It will remain so. Years of exponential experience have some lessons provided to those that have their eyes and ears tuned to the world of agriculture. There are no absolutes in agriculture. The human mind has to follow the dictates of the requirements of the country. Innovations will always pay of in the short run it is not even the midterm.
The trouble in a stagnant economy is that once prices go up they never come down. So what is to be done? After WW-II the UK and other war-ravaged countries started what were called victory gardens. Since then edible gardens have been started by people like Wendell Berry. The lawns were removed and 40% of the vegetables were grown by the house owner themselves. Why have we not done so in these large feudal houses of Islamabad where ego lawns are available but no vegetables or fruit trees are put in place?
The economics of local produce has to be made a possibility for it is no longer possible for vegetables especially the perishables to come from Balochistan or Sindh with petrol prices where they are the cost of hiring a truck is over Rs one lakh.
As a result, poverty has increased and the middle-class has another nail in the coffin. The social impact of inflation is that the crime rate will go up and the people will in times to come demand an explanation and when none will be forthcoming the danger of upheaval cannot be ruled out. The marginal and peripheral areas where the majority of the poor live have another issue; most of them do not get three meals a day and there have been some deaths due to starvation. There are serious implications for Pakistani consumer as the fat slobs of society are doing whatever they can to destroy the social fabric of this country. Why allow that to happen. After the event regrets are of no consequence.
The sea coast can be farmed and the sea water can be used for producing six vegetables. And we have a huge sea coast. So there is more to life than the morons we got educated at the taxpayers' account. Do not tell me what the foreigners will do for us or that Kerry Lugar bill will do wonders for us. Nations have to do their own work and determine their destiny. We have forgotten the promises we make to our inhabitants. The danger of Islamabad coming under terrorist pressure cannot be ruled out. What these Islamabadians did to the rest of the country chickens now coming home to roost. The writing is on the wall but then we are blind in the ears and deaf in the eyes!! Rogues that we are.