Editorial
What use the exercise in semantics?
Food crunch is a stark reality
RECENTLY we have heard three phrases being used by highly placed and well-known persons to describe the food situation in the country. Former adviser to caretaker government and now chairman Regulatory Commission Akbar Ali Khan says we are going through a 'quiet famine' phase. Food and disaster management adviser Shawkat Ali calls it 'hidden hunger'. Chief of Army Staff General Moeen U Ahmed argued he didn't see any crisis, although the food price has increased, hinting at 'panic' buying.
Such portrayal of the current food scene through any grim phrase, or in contrast, by euphemisms, apparently in a denial mode or making light of it notwithstanding, the stark reality is represented by the ever lengthening queues before BDR-operated fair price shops or dealer-run OMS operations. The rising prices and the falling purchasing power of the consumers, to say nothing of the three and a half crore ultra-poor people, conjure up a scene of sheer hardship, and undernourishment of many more people than in normal years.
People are hardly interested in semantics; instead, they are keen to know about and see measures the government is putting in place to see them through the critical phase of their life. Particularly crucial is April-May period before the predictably bumper boro and wheat harvests hit home and the market places.
In a front page investigative report in our paper, the procurement and import deficits have been identified by reference to previous year's benchmark. The government could not achieve its rice procurement target as it offered a price lower than the market prices. To make matters worse, the import of rice was less than satisfactory because of high prices and scarcity of cereals on the international market. The response to government's invitation of tenders for 36 times during the last fiscal was lukewarm. Moreover, some of the traders who received work orders and signed deals with the government finally backed out due to price increase on the international market.
The experience we have learnt from unsatisfactory domestic procurement and unsteady imports is two fold: one, the procurement price cannot be lower than the market price if we are to induce the growers to sell to the government; and two, we need to have a taskforce with government and private sector representatives to expedite the import process. Let's utilise our experience from here on.
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