Roshan Malik
E-mail: saag@sdpi.org

Government Policy Package for Corporate Agriculture Farming (CAF) is a matter of great controversy within the government circles, civil society organizations and small farmer groups. Its advocates claim that the policy will bring foreign investors, latest machinery and new methods of cultivation in the country. This will not only enhance agricultural production but the improvement in quality as well.

According to the policy, government has declared CAF as industry, which will enjoy sufficient credit facilities available with the banks for corporate entities. There will be no upper ceiling on land holding by providing legal cover to investors by amending Land Reform Act 1977.

The state land may either be sold or leased for 50 years and extendable for 49 years to interested investors. There will no customs duty on the agricultural machinery imported for CAF. There is also an exemption of duty on transfer of land for corporate agriculture companies.

Land Reform Act 1977 will have to be amended by including definition of Corporate Agriculture Farming in Article 2 as well as to incorporate verdict by Shariat Appellate Bench of the Supreme Court in 1991 which allows the state to acquire any land any where in the country. While CAF policy is one step ahead from that of the verdict, it is designed for the investor's convenience while ignoring landless poor farmers to be provided the state owned land.

CAF is a model for wealthy countries that wish to pursue industrial agriculture. It denies the interest and needs of small vulnerable farmers who do not live in that world. After World War II, developed countries provided huge subsidies to their agriculture sector to overcome the food shortage. But the situation in our country is very different.

The abolition of subsidies, domestic support, imposition of GST on fertilizers and increase in power tariffs are already pushing the farmers to the wall. But the CAF policy will further aggravate their problem. The policy provides more privileges to CAF Investors.

More than 45% of our population's income is from agriculture sector and 93% of them are small farmers, having very meager resources to afford hi-tech machinery for cultivation. The invasion of CAF investors equipped with latest machinery and capital will leave the small poor farmers far behind to compete in cost and method of production. Similarly, corporate firms will be more interested in cash crops instead of food crops. Therefore, it may promote monoculture-cropping system, which is a direct risk to our food security.

The local resources will be no more in the hands of small farmers and their food security will be on stake because their production will be no more competitive in the market. The farmers will either get jobs without labor laws or mass exodus to the cities, which is already a challenge for town planners. This will further enlarge the vicious circle of poverty at national level.

The advocates of CAF claims that there will be increase in production and economic activity. In the last two years Pakistan had bumper wheat production but many people and cattle died from hunger. It shows that our food distribution mechanism needs to be addressed seriously.

CAF policy is capital oriented rather than labor conducive. It is more based on the imported agricultural implements by bringing the tariffs to zero percent, completely ignoring the nascent domestic industry producing agricultural implements in Mian Chanu and Okara.

In CAF all the issues revolve around state land. Although Supreme Court's verdict gives the state, a right to acquire land, but it does not mean that the land would be sold or leased to foreign companies. The local communities, the besieged tenants, the landless poor, the vulnerable downtrodden should be given the culturable wasteland owned by the government. It will bring them out of the poverty trap and provide them better livelihoods.

Implementation of CAF policy will result into the massive eviction of indigenous communities living in Balochistan, Cholistan, Greater Thal and riverine areas. They are already drought ridden and their vulnerability will be further increased when they will be pressurized to evict the land for corporate masters.

The culturable wasteland in Cholistan (Bahowalpur, Rahimyarkhan, Bahawalpur) is 6.6 million acres and 1.2 million are its inhabitants. Since 1978 only 350000 acres were allotted to its 30000 applicants while 5784 applications are still pending. The persons who were allotted lands are now in better economic conditions as compared to majority of the poor landless Rohailas (inhabitants). The allotment of the land is banned regardless of the promises and commitments of the successive governments to allot the land to the landless Rohailas.

Being a signatory to United Nation Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), a report submitted in April 2002 by the government to UNCCD secretariat says that the state owned lands would be distributed among the poor to reduce poverty.

Similarly, in Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, government clearly said that the state owned land would be distributed among the poor to bring them out of vicious circle of poverty. Same was the case in the referendum campaign in which the President Gen. Musharraf said in his public meetings that the land will be distributed among the landless tenants to improve their livelihoods and provide them better economic conditions.

Either it is lack of coordination within the government departments or the arm twisting by the corporate sector; the cabinet has approved CAF policy. It is quite evident that the policies are further widening the gap between the two halves.

Either North's evaluation mechanism lacks or it intentionally ignores the realities and same is the case with our policy architects. It is necessary for us to look the ground realities. CAF was developed in the North by huge subsidies provided by the government to agriculture sector. While we are introducing the policy in view of the perspective of trade liberalization.

Therefore it is necessary to capacitate the small poor farmers by providing them support so they may be able to compete with the MNCs. Otherwise CAF will be boon for MNCs, challenge for feudal lords (if they don't join the MNCs) and bane for small farmers and they will be unable to take part in agriculture production.

(The writer is working in Sustainable Agriculture Action Group (SAAG), Islamabad)