The meeting was attended by Federal Minister for Food and Agriculture Nazar Muhammad Gondal, PPP leader Farhatullah Babar and senior officials of ministry of food. The meeting looked into the aspect of speeding up the wheat import, which is the responsibility of Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP). The issue is likely to come up for discussion during the cabinet meeting being held on Monday (today). The cabinet meeting is convened in order to look into the security situation in the wake of suicide attack on Marriott Hotel. Advisor to Prime Minister on Interior Rehman Malik will brief the cabinet about the measures, being taken to ensure security in the major cities of the country.
Officials, however, said that since the availability of wheat is a crucial matter, therefore, the issue could come up for either formal or informal discussion during cabinet's meeting.
The wheat stocks were well over 4.5 million tonnes on September 9. However, these stocks have now declined to 3.33 million tonnes by September 16, 2008. This is sharp decline and it might undermine the efforts of government to provide wheat flour at reasonable price to the consumers.
The meeting also reviewed ongoing process of wheat import. A total of 2.5 million tonnes would be imported as per the decision of federal cabinet. The TCP has already imported 1.7 million tonnes of wheat so far. Official said that the import process will be completed by the end of December.
The Prime Minister also directed the food and agriculture ministry to ensure that wheat target is achieved in the coming Rabi season. As a first step in this direction the ministry should encourage timely sowing of wheat, he urged.