The Prime Minister, Muhammad Shiaa Al-Sudani, announced the start of the marketing season for wheat and barley crops in Wasit Governorate, to which he arrived this morning, Wednesday.
Al-Sudani visited, according to a statement by his office, the laboratory for the examination of grains, and was briefed on the mechanisms of work in it.
Al-Sudani handed over a financial cheque to the first farmer who marketed his crops of wheat and barley, praising the efforts of farmers, while affirming the government's support for them to establish agricultural projects.
Al-Sudani announced, "Supporting full-time agricultural graduates from the faculties of Agriculture, Veterinary, and Agricultural Institutes and preparatory schools, by granting them agricultural lands and financial loans to establish their agricultural projects, in a way that supports agriculture, which along with industry constitute two main sectors in moving the wheel of the Iraqi economy."
The Prime Minister said in a speech to him, "Supporting agriculture is not a luxury, but rather we are facing a crisis of existence and a crisis of securing food for the people," noting that "the government began its work at the beginning of the agricultural season, and the agricultural plan before it was about 4.5 million dunums, in light of Water scarcity conditions facing the region and Iraq.
He added, "the areas of the agricultural plan were distributed over irrigated lands only, and other areas that depend on artesian wells, and after the current rainy season, the agricultural plan exceeded 7.5 million dunums in all governorates, indicating that farmers suffer from the problem of timing their supply of fertilizers, due to restrictive decisions to import them, and a decision was taken From the Council of Ministers to lift this restriction for the private sector to import fertilizers.
He stressed that "the security determinants of importing fertilizers have been addressed, and we have overcome this problem, which was causing the price of fertilizer to rise and its impact on farmers," noting, "There is an effort by the Ministry of Industry to operate the full production capacity of our factories, whether they are managed by the ministry or operated by investment with the private sector." ".
He explained that "the Wasit Governorate plan is about 900 thousand dunums for wheat, and about 120 thousand dunums for barley, and the Cabinet's decision included inside and outside the agricultural plan, because wheat and barley are important strategic crops for food security, and we noticed in these areas a clear weakness in the use of the sprinkler irrigation system in the governorate And out of all these areas, 1445 dunums are used for sprinkler irrigation systems, and the use of wells is about 6422 dunums, in light of the water scarcity, which is the most prominent in the history of Iraq.
He noted that "sprinkler irrigation methods are not only a treatment for water scarcity, but rather the best way to increase productivity, and we want productive agriculture, starting with the use of high-productivity varieties and the use of mechanization and fertilizers, and all of these processes provide an economic return parallel to the efforts of farmers, and our duty as a government is to provide irrigation systems spraying, and granting loans to those who use them.”
Al-Sudani stressed, "We will support either the outputs or the inputs of the agricultural process. We can raise the price from 850 thousand dinars per ton to reach one million dinars, but we want to target the real farmer." Every 10 days there is funding for the Ministry of Trade, and in turn it funds the provinces.”
He continued, "I reassure all farmers, and call on them to follow the marketing procedures to get the right price, instead of selling the crop to the merchant under the pretext that the government will be late in paying the dues, and the employees work in morning and evening shifts for this, and the government has set in its ministerial platform to support small farmers, by activating the lending fund and granting soft loans, and the fund is headed by the Minister of Agriculture, and its allocations are from the budget or from recovering the amounts of the agricultural initiative.
Al-Sudani stressed, "We will support every farmer who goes towards agricultural projects, whether it is at the level of cabinet decisions or decisions to protect the national product. It is not possible to accommodate all graduates in government jobs, so we will support full-time agricultural graduates of agricultural and veterinary faculties, institutes and preparatory schools, by allocating land for them and granting them agricultural loans.
The Prime Minister appreciated "the efforts of the Ministries of Agriculture and Commerce, the Governor of Wasit, and members of the House of Representatives, and we value the efforts of the peasant associations, the true representative of the farmer."
Source: National Iraqi News Agency