Business desk
KARACHI: Pasban Democratic Party PDP Chairman Altaf Shakoor here Sunday warned that a grave food crisis is looming large over the country.
He said vast farmlands in Sindh are still inundated in accumulated rainwater and if wheat crop is not sown in this Rabi season, next year wheat flour could not be available even at Rs300 per kilograms.
He said the federal and Sindh governments have shown a criminal negligence in draining out of rainwater from fields and farmlands and resultantly sowing of Rabi crops especially wheat is a big uncertain. He said if the government continued showing negligence in applying heavy pumping machines to drain out this water they would be responsible for the potential food crisis that would be even big calamity than rains and floods.
Altaf Shakoor said we are facing a donor fatigue. NGOs and relief organizations have mostly closed down their donation collection camps and media has diverted its focus away from the sufferings of the millions of displaced people to political melodrama of a few filthy corrupt and habitual lier politicians.
He said the government and all major political parties have forgotten the flood affectees and they are busy in their own political mudslinging. He said this situation shows a shameful apathy of our society towards our millions of displaced brothers and sisters.
Altaf Shakoor said only a big pumping operation in rural farmlands of Sindh could ensure sowing of timely Rabi crops; otherwise, a dreadful food crisis in on the cards. He said France has donated water pumps for a swift drainage of rainwater but no one knows where they have gone. He said accumulated rainwater has brought waterborne diseases like malaria, typhoid and dengue.
