Former President ICCI Shahid Rasheed Butt on Wednesday said masses would continue to face flour crisis for the third year in a row owing to shortage of quality seed for cultivation. Increasing wheat support price and fixing targets is not enough to ensure food security and the authorities must do something to provide economical fertilizer, loans, subsidized diesel, quality pesticides and certified seed.

He said that the issues of farmers should be resolved. Otherwise, the masses will not get any relief.

Shahid Rasheed Butt said that country needs at least one million tonnes of seed for the wheat crop, but almost half of the quantity is available fanning concerns among the stakeholders.

The state-run departments only hold almost three per cent of the seed while the rest of the seed is with the private sector with a significant part of it has questionable quality.

He noted that the quality seed available in the country is hardly 20 to 25 per cent of the requirement while the rest is substandard, which amounts to playing with the future of the country.

The business leader said that rules and regulations in this sector are confusing, vague and not according to the ground realities while the concerned departments lack human resources, will, quality and efficiency. At the same time, research is almost non-existent in this critical sector on which the whole population of the country depends.