ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Industries and Production Makhdum Khusro Bakhtyar held a fertilizer review meeting with fertilizer industry on Friday.
The meeting discussed the current position of supply chain of urea in the country. Chief Secretary Punjab apprised the Chair on action taken by Punjab Government against the hoarders since last two weeks, whereby inspection teams booked 159 involved in hoarding/black marketing of urea.
About 2.76 lac tonne urea had been confiscated during the raids as well as district administration auctioned the urea bags at notified rates i.e. Rs 1768/bag. The fertilizer industry also shared the latest position of supply of urea in the country through real time portal which showed inter-provincial distribution anomalies of urea.
Speaking to the meeting, the Minister said that the Sindh government had become a safe haven for hoarders and profiteers. He appreciated the efforts of Punjab government against hoarders and said that he expected the same measures will be taken by Sindh government to provide urea at affordable prices for increased wheat production throughout the country in the interest of public welfare at large.
Furthermore, the Minister stated that owning to negligence of Sindh government towards controlling prices of essential commodities in the province especially Karachi and Hyderabad, the country had witnessed an increased inflation rate over the past years which had put a lot of pressure on our economy in term of high interest rate, which need to be done to control the inflation.
In concluding remarks, the Minister stated that the incumbent government was taking all possible measures for robust supply of urea to farmers at affordable prices for wheat sowing. He also assured the constant monitoring of supply of urea from manufacturing units and movement of fertilizers at selling points across the country. He lauded the action of fertilizer manufacturers to blacklist the hoarders to smoothen the supply chain and market correction of urea countrywide.