The Centre for Governance and Public Management (CGPM), and Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) organised a seminar to provide structured feedback and suggestions on the draft Punjab Agriculture Policy prepared by the Punjab Agriculture Commission. Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan, VC Agriculture University Faisalabad outlined the broad contours of the policy, after which the participants discussed in detail the challenges faced by agriculture in Punjab and the proposed policy responses. Dr Ahsan Rana, Director CGPM moderated the seminar.
Participants of the seminar included leading businessman Syed Babar Ali, Vice Chancellor LUMS Dr Sohail Naqvi, several LUMS faculty members, alumni of Suleman Dawood School of Business (SDSB) Executive Certificate in Agribusiness Management (ECAM) and a few agribusiness leaders.
Dr Iqrar shared the policy proposals on nine broad issues related to Punjab's agriculture. These issues included; productivity increase, adapting to climate change, poverty alleviation, input subsidies, agriculture research and extension, improving seed provision, agriculture produce markets, genetically modified crops, and meeting globalisation challenges.
These policy proposals emphasised increased use of technology, the need to improve farming practices, increasing investment in agricultural R&D, and developing a more robust legal and institutional infrastructure.
While commenting on the draft Punjab Agriculture Policy leading businessman Syed Babar Ali identified the exponentially growing population as a key challenge affecting agricultural productivity, modernisation, and government efforts to alleviate poverty. He also identified the very large, unproductive animal population and lack of access to the credit markets as key constraints for farmers.
Dr Jawad Syed, Dean of SDSB, gave his concluding remarks. He said that new technology, improved genetics, access to markets (virtual and physical), and strengthened credit markets are central to improving agricultural productivity. Further, the debate on poverty, urbanisation, women empowerment and malnutrition all relate directly to people. Then there are external factors, such as political economy, governance, climate change, globalisation and international competition. Finally, he said research advocacy and stakeholder activism is strongly connected; therefore, there is a need to promote and encourage stakeholder activism.
Speakers also talked about the role of the government and private enterprises, the need for strategic prioritising, ensuring that agriculture gets the importance of a primary industry in Pakistan, and creating adequate price incentives for small farmers.