Pakistan floods raise fears of hunger after crops wrecked 

Internally displaced people gather to receive free food near their makeshift camp in the flood-hit Chachro of Sindh province on September 19, 2022. (AFP)
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Updated 26 September 2022
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Pakistan floods raise fears of hunger after crops wrecked 

  • Pakistan’s agricultural sector had been growing in recent years, allowing country to export some wheat and rice 
  • Cotton losses could hurt biggest export, textiles and clothes, which brought in more than $20 billion annually 

KHAIRPUR: Like every year, Arz Mohammed had planted his little patch of land in southern Pakistan with cotton. The crop would earn him enough so that, as he puts it, his family of five wouldn’t be reduced to begging. Then came the deluge. 

Pakistan’s massive floods this summer collapsed Mohammed’s home and destroyed his four acres of cotton, wiping out most of his income. 

On top of that, his land and that of his neighbors remain underwater, three months after the heaviest rains stopped. Like many farmers across southern Pakistan, he may not be able to plant his next crop — wheat — in time. 

That could spell trouble for the country’s food supply. 

“These rains have destroyed everything for us,” said Mohammed, who lives in a tent with his wife and children near his wrecked house in Khairpur, one of the country’s hardest-hit districts. “We don’t even have anything to eat.” 

This summer’s flooding, caused by monsoon rains nearly triple the usual ferocity, wiped out huge swaths of crops, leaving already impoverished families struggling to obtain food. Farmers and officials warn that Pakistan could now face serious food shortages at a time when the government is strapped for cash and world food prices are high. 




Farmers collect apples from remaining floodwaters due to heavy monsoon rains, at an orchard in Hanna Urak near Quetta, Pakistan, Saturday, Sept. 17, 2022. (AP)

Nearly 15 percent of Pakistan’s rice crop and 40 percent of its cotton crop were lost, according to officials. The waters also wiped out the personal grain stores that many farming families rely on for food yearlong. 

The flooding, blamed in part on climate change, killed nearly 1,600 people, damaged nearly 2 million homes and overall wreaked damage estimated at more than $30 billion. 

At the United Nations last week, Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif told The Associated Press that crops on 4 million acres were washed away. “We need funds to provide livelihood to our people. We need funds to compensate for the loss of crops to our people, to our farmers.” 

The government says there is no immediate worry about food supplies. In a statement to the AP, the state disaster agency said wheat stock are enough to last through the next harvest and that the government is importing more. 




A farmer collects apples beside damaged trees caused floodwaters due heavy monsoon rains, at an orchard in Hanna Urak near Quetta, Pakistan, Saturday, Sept. 17, 2022. (AP)

However, the upcoming wheat crop has been thrown into uncertainty. Planting usually starts in October. In Punjab province, the country’s main wheat producer, fields suffered less damage and can be sown in time. But in southern Sindh province, the second largest producer, some 50 percent of the fields remain underwater, according to Jam Khan Shoro, a provincial irrigation minister in Sindh. 

Aerial footage in Sindh shows field after field still inundated. The province, in Pakistan’s southern lowlands at the downstream end of its major rivers, is where the floods hit hardest: 80 percent of the rice crop and 70 percent of cotton were destroyed, devastating the livelihoods of the small farmers who make up most the production. 

Altaf Hussain Marri, a larger and relatively well-off landholder in Khairpur, said he normally gives away wheat as a gift to friends and family. Now he’s worried about having enough for himself and his children, unsure if his 400 inundated acres will drain in time. The floods demolished his cotton and rice crops, worth around $40,000. 

“If we fail to grow wheat ... next year we might not have even wheat to eat,” Marri said. “It will create food insecurity in the country. The poor will suffer a lot. There will be no flour.” 

Pakistan’s agricultural sector had been growing in recent years, allowing the country to export some wheat and rice. 




Villagers works in flooded rice field caused by heavy monsoon rains, in Dera Allahyar area of Jaffarabad, a district of southwestern Baluchistan province, Pakistan, Saturday, Sept. 17, 2022. (AP)

“Now we will have to import wheat and other food items,” Pakistan’s Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal told the AP. 

Sharif, the prime minister, said Pakistan may have to import about a million metric tons of wheat, and it could come from Russia, but Pakistan is open to other offers if the price is right. 

Pakistan has already put out orders to import 500,000 metric tons of wheat, Planning Ministry officials say. There are contingency plans to buy as much 2.5 million tons over the next year, but officials are waiting to see how much wheat is planted, they said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the policy was not yet set. 

Ashfaq Ahmad, a senior economist, said the additional wheat needs to be brought in quickly, by next month. 

Otherwise, “I am seeing a food crisis in December,” he told the AP. “Any delay in the import of wheat will cause food shortage.” 

The flooding was also a blow to Pakistan’s important cash crops. Losses will mean lower exports of rice, which earned $2 billion in 2020. Cotton losses could hurt the country’s biggest export, textiles and clothes, which brought in more than $20 billion annually in recent years. 

But the greater damage and danger is likely to Pakistan’s poor, with no margin to endure losses in income and food. 

In Dasht, a remote district of Baluchistan province, hundreds of orchard owners worry about their future after losing crops of grapes, apples and other fruits. In parts of Baluchistan, piles upon piles of rotten apples can be seen in submerged areas. 

Even before the floods, some 38 million Pakistanis, more than 16 percent of the population, were living in moderate or severe food insecurity, meaning they were uncertain about being able to obtain food or at times have outright gone without eating, according to the World Health Organization. Nearly 18 percent of children were acutely malnourished. 

The blow to the food supply and incomes will tip those populations deeper into hunger, UN agencies have warned. The UN’s World Food Program has so far delivered food to 600,000 flood survivors. 

Iqbal, the planning minister, said Sindh province is the country’s biggest producer of vegetables for domestic markets. Those crops were lost, along with families’ personal stores of grains for themselves and feed for their livestock. 

“So, therefore we have a real food security challenge at hand,” he said. 

On the ground in Sukkur, another hard-hit district neighboring Khairpur, the local agricultural director Rasool Bux Junejo fears the worst. Farmers won’t be able to grow wheat or other key crops like sunflowers and mustard. 

“That will be a huge loss in the coming months. If you ask me as an agriculture worker, I foresee famine, God forbid,” he said. “We will be unable to provide food to our people.” 


Pakistan parliament approves bills to extend tenure of services chiefs to five years

Updated 04 November 2024
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Pakistan parliament approves bills to extend tenure of services chiefs to five years

  • Extension in services of army, navy and air force chiefs follows controversial amendments to the constitution last month
  • The opposition PTI party condemns the amendments for changing Pakistan “from a democracy into a monarchy”

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s National Assembly and Senate on Monday approved bills to extend the tenure of the army, navy, and air force chiefs from three to five years, amid protests by the opposition benches. 

The office of the army chief is considered to be the most powerful in the country, with the army having ruled Pakistan for almost half of its 75-year history. Even when not directly in power, the army is considered to be the invisible guiding hand in politics and holds considerable sway in internal security, foreign policy, and economic affairs, among other domains. 

Six bills were passed by the upper and lower houses on Monday evening, including one to increase the term of the services chiefs.

“In the said Act, in section 8A, in sub-section (1), for the expression “three (03)” the word “five (05)” shall be substituted,” read the bill, seeking to amend the Pakistan Army Act, 1952.

Similar bills were passed to increase the duration of the country’s naval and air force chiefs to five years also. 

“The purpose of these amendments are to make consistent the Pakistan Army Act, 1952 (XXXIX of 1952) The Pakistan Navy Ordinance, 1961 (Ordinance No. XXXV of 1961) and The Pakistan Air Force Act, 1953 (VI of 1953) with the maximum tenure of the Chief of the Army Staff, the Chief of the Naval Staff and the Chief of the Air Staff and to make consequential amendments for uniformity in the aforementioned laws.” 

Speaking outside parliament, the chairman of the opposition PTI party, Gohar Ali Khan, said:

“Today, democracy has been changed into a monarchy.”

Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly, Omar Ayub Khan, said “modifying the service chiefs’ tenure is not a good thing for the country and the armed forces.”

The passage of the new bills follows controversial amendments made to the constitution last month, granting lawmakers the authority to nominate the chief justice of Pakistan, who previously used to be automatically appointed according to the principle of seniority.

The amendments allowed the government to bypass the senior-most judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, and appoint Justice Yahya Afridi as the country’s top judge, replacing former chief justice Qazi Faez Isa. 

The opposition and the legal fraternity had opposed the amendments, arguing that they were aimed at granting more power to the executive in making judicial appointments and curtailing the independence of the judiciary. The government denies this.


Pakistani forces kill six militants in shootouts near border with Afghanistan — military

Updated 04 November 2024
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Pakistani forces kill six militants in shootouts near border with Afghanistan — military

  • Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan, has witnessed a number of attacks recently
  • Pakistan blames the surge in militancy on militants operating out of Afghanistan, Kabul denies the allegations

ISLAMABAD: Pakistani security forces have killed six militants in two separate engagements in the country’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, the Pakistani military said on Monday.
A militant was killed in an exchange of fire during an intelligence-based operation in North Waziristan’s Dosali area, according to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the military’s media wing.
In the second incident, Pakistani forces intercepted a group of militants while infiltrating the country’s border with Afghanistan in the South Waziristan district. Five militants were killed as a result.
“Pakistan has consistently been asking Interim Afghan Government to ensure effective border management on their side of the border,” the ISPR said in a statement.
“Interim Afghan Government is expected to fulfil its obligations and deny the use of Afghan soil by Khwarij [militants] for perpetuating acts of terrorism against Pakistan.”
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which borders Afghanistan, has witnessed a number of attacks by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other militant groups that targeted security forces convoys and check posts, besides targeted killings and kidnappings of law enforcers and government officials in recent months.
Pakistan has frequently accused neighboring Afghanistan of sheltering and supporting militant groups, urging the Taliban administration in Kabul to prevent its territory from being used by armed factions to launch cross-border attacks.
Afghan officials, however, deny involvement, insisting Pakistan’s security issues are an internal matter of Islamabad.
 


Pakistan Navy test-fires ship-launched ballistic missile ranging 350 kilometers

Updated 04 November 2024
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Pakistan Navy test-fires ship-launched ballistic missile ranging 350 kilometers

  • The missile is capable of striking land and sea targets with ‘high precision’
  • Pakistan, India consider their missile programs as deterrent against each other

KARACHI: Pakistan Navy has successfully test-fired a ship-launched ballistic missile having a range of 350 km and capable of striking both land and sea targets, it said on Monday.
Pakistan sees its missile development as a deterrent against nuclear-armed arch-foe India. Both countries have fought multiple wars since their independence from Britain in 1947.
The two South Asian neighbors have long been developing missiles of varying ranges in a bid to ensure deterrence against possible attacks from each other, with analysts often warning these developments could push the region into an arms race.
“Pakistan Navy conducted a successful flight test of an indigenously developed ship-launched ballistic missile,” the Directorate General of Public Relations (DGPR) of Pakistan Navy said in a statement.
“The weapon system with 350km range is capable of engaging land and sea targets with high precision.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikldB3jieWo
The flight test of the weapon system, equipped with a state-of-the-art navigation system and maneuverability features, was witnessed by Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Naveed Ashraf, senior naval officers, scientists and engineers.
President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee General Sahir Shamshad Mirza, Chief of Army Staff General Asim Munir and Chief of Air Staff Air Marshal Zaheer Ahmad Babar Sidhu congratulated the participating navy units and scientists on the development.
 
 


Qatar investment team due in Pakistan this month, PM Sharif says after Doha visit

Updated 04 November 2024
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Qatar investment team due in Pakistan this month, PM Sharif says after Doha visit

  • The statement comes days after Sharif visited Qatar seeking to bolster economic cooperation between both nations
  • Before arriving in Doha, Sharif attended the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh and met the Saudi Crown Prince

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Monday a team of the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) will visit Pakistan this month to set up an information technology (IT) park in the South Asian country.
The statement came days after Sharif visited Qatar while seeking to bolster economic cooperation amid Pakistan’s efforts to boost foreign investment to stabilize its frail $350 billion economy.
Before arriving in Doha, Sharif attended the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he discussed trade and investment with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Speaking at a meeting of his cabinet, Sharif said a QIA team will visit Pakistan this month, while its chief of Asia-Pacific & Africa Investments, Faisal Bin Thani Al Thani, will also arrive in Islamabad by the end of this month.
“Qatar emir said the same thing. They also suggested setting up an IT park here [in Pakistan],” Sharif told his cabinet members in televised comments.
During his visit, Sharif led delegation-level talks with the Qatari emir before holding a separate meeting with him to discuss a wide array of issues.
“The leaders reviewed the entire spectrum of Pakistan-Qatar relations, exploring potential avenues for enhanced cooperation in trade, potential areas of investment, energy, and culture,” Sharif’s office said last week.
He also met a delegation of the Qatar Businessmen Association (QBA) and invited them to invest in Pakistan’s energy, infrastructure and technology sectors.
The developments came amid Pakistan’s attempts to increase trade and foreign investment after it narrowly escaped a default last year by securing a last-gasp $3 billion financial assistance package from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The South Asian country has since sought to promote closer economic ties with regional and international allies to bolster its fragile economy, which has been suffering from a prolonged macroeconomic crisis.
 


Pakistan central bank cuts key rate by 250 bps to 15%

Updated 04 November 2024
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Pakistan central bank cuts key rate by 250 bps to 15%

  • Monday’s move follows cuts of 150 bps in June, 100 in July and 200 in September
  • It takes the total policy rate cuts in the country to 700 bps in under five months

KARACHI: Pakistan’s central bank cut its key policy rate by 250 basis points to 15 percent on Monday, it said in a statement, for a fourth straight reduction since June, as the country keeps up efforts to revive a sluggish economy with inflation easing.
Most respondents in a Reuters poll last week expected a cut of 200 bps after inflation moved down sharply from a multi-decade high of nearly 40 percent in May 2023, saying reductions were needed to bolster growth.
Average consumer price index inflation in the South Asian country is 8.7 percent in the current financial year, which started in July, the statistics bureau says. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) expects inflation to average 9.5 percent for the year ending June.
Monday’s move follows cuts of 150 bps in June, 100 bps in July, and 200 in September that have taken the rate from an all-time high of 22 percent, set in June 2023 and left unchanged for a year. It takes the total cuts to 700 bps in under five months.
October inflation came in at 7.2 percent, slightly above the government’s expectation of 6 percent to 7 percent. The finance ministry expects inflation to slow further to 5.5 percent to 6.5 percent in November.
However, inflation could pick up again in 2025, driven by electricity and gas price increases after a new $7-billion IMF bailout, and the potential impact of taxes on the retail, wholesale and the farm sector announced in the June budget to take effect in January 2025, some analysts say.