New Delhi, Jan 21 (IANS) Experts in Pakistan have slammed the expansion of corporate farming and land acquisition, lamenting that such government schemes are displacing farmers and privatising land and water resources, particularly in Punjab and Sindh.
A report in viacampesina.org detailed the outcome of the Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee (PKRC) meeting in Lahore which announced nationwide mobilisation against corporate farming, land grabbing, and the deepening agrarian crisis.
Around 170 delegates representing 35 farmers’ and rural workers’ organisations from across Pakistan reviewed the country’s political, economic, agrarian, and environmental challenges.
They blamed “IMF-driven neoliberal policies for rising input costs, falling farm incomes, and increased pressure on small farmers and tenants,” said the report.
They also discussed climate-related issues, including floods, water scarcity, and soil degradation, with delegates noting that rural communities are suffering the most.
The meeting announced nationwide protests on March 28, against corporate farming, land grabbing, unfair crop prices and lack of a guaranteed minimum support price, among other issues.
A recent report said that Pakistan’s sugar industry has turned into a nexus of political patronage, economic exploitation, and institutional capture dominated by the politically connected families of the country. It added that these groups control both the production and policy-making of the sector, which was once a cornerstone of the South Asian nation’s agricultural productivity and rural livelihoods.
According to the Greek publication Directus, at the centre of this crisis lies a deeply entrenched sugar cartel leveraging its dual roles as industrialists and legislators to manipulate supply chains, distort pricing, and pocket excessive profits from both farmers and consumers.
The report stated that this amounts to a regressive wealth transfer of Pakistani rupees 610 billion annually, equivalent to 1.22 per cent of Pakistan’s GDP, siphoning funds from ordinary households into the coffers of affluent mill owners.
The sugar crisis is not a natural disaster but a man-made economic calamity rooted in elite capture, policy manipulation, and institutional failure. Without transparent reforms, robust enforcement, and political will to dismantle entrenched interests, Pakistan will remain trapped in a cycle of artificial shortages, inflated prices, and systemic exploitation, the report noted.
–IANS
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