ISLAMABAD: The special team of the Federal Investigation Agency, constituted by federal government, to determine the responsible persons behind the recent wheat crisis across the country, has dispatched its investigation report to Prime minister Imran Khan, giving clean chit to everyone and declaring mismanagement as the main reason behind the crisis.
The report carrying total production of wheat, the surplus amount, and a list of individuals who purchased the commodity from the open market, was prepared by a team headed by the FIA’s director, a well-informed sources told the news today. IB and Punjab anti-corruption officials were also part of the committee.
Sources confirmed that the team throughout the investigation conducted interrogation with high level official of ministry of food and agriculture, Provincial food departments and Pakistan Agricultural Storage and Services Corporation (PASSCO), a government agency working in the storage sector of Pakistan.
The Prime minister has also shared report with Provinces, declaring that the crisis was created artificially and mismanagement was the main reason behind this. The report also gave clean chit to those the influential personalities, who were blamed for it and has an important say in the PTI government’s governance and political matters in general and on the subject of agriculture in particular. The report held Provinces responsible for mismanagement, sources said.
The report, carrying recommendation, recommended provincial administrations strict vigilance at district level to cope with wheat hoarders and profiteers. Amount of wheat bought by the mill owners and the amount of wheat flour produced by those mills included in the report.
When contacted Secretary national food security Hashim Popalzai confirmed that there was no wheat and Atta crisis in the country; it was created artificially and mismanagement at Provincial level was the reason. He informed that current stock of wheat in the country was 2.1 million metric tons and despite economic coordination committee approval to import, we have issued not a signal permit to exporters, owing to sufficient stock.
He has forecast 27 million tons of wheat for the next fiscal year including 0.8 to 1 million ton of surpluses stock. Answering a question, he said, no decision has been taken to export wheat to Afghanistan in next financial year.
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