Farmers feel pinch of turmoil: Muhith

Finance Minister AMA Muhith said Monday that the ongoing blockade and strikes have largely affected farmers, especially the vegetable growers.
Terming disruption of connectivity between big cities and rural areas for nearly 40 days as disastrous, he said the agriculture sector is now worst-affected in the crisis.
"One must accept that there has been an agricultural revolution in the country which was seeing around 3 to 4 per cent growth every year. We have been beneficiary of such a growth. But the sector is now in a very bad shape," the minister told newsmen after a meeting with a delegation of the Bangladesh International Arbitration Centre (BIAC) at his Secretariat office.
A delegation of the BIAC led by its chairman Mahbubur Rahman met the minister. Other members of the delegation included Latifur Rahman, Rokia Afzal Rahman and Fazlul Huq.
Replying to a query, Mr Muhith said there is no estimate how much the country suffered due to the ongoing political crisis, but said he will get a report on it by the end of this month.
He, however, said the situation in terms of connectivity has slightly improved.
Regarding businessmen's demand of cash incentive or other policy supports to offset losses they incurred due to the political impasse Mr Muhith said: "The BGMEA has not suffered much. The textile sector also has not suffered at all. This is my assessment."
He said their production is going well and export has not also been barred. "But they are victims of an image crisis. Because, buyers who place orders are concerned as to whether the manufacturers will be able to supply apparels timely."
Mr Muhith came down heavily on the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) for continuing blockade and strikes for nearly 40 days.
"One lady has made the country hostage. That's totally unacceptable," he said.
Regarding a move by 'Nagarik Samaj', a platform of civil society people, he said, "I have no feeling about their move. It's totally ineffective."
Asked why he termed it ineffective, the minister said, "The first position of this platform should have been to ask Khaleda Zia that we don't want this situation to prevail. Please withdraw your programmes. But the platform has not done it."
He said there is no need of holding a dialogue to resolve the ongoing political crisis.  
Mr Muhith also talked about empowering field- level government officials in procurement and recruitment. "There are some rules which are very old. Field-level officials can't spend a lot despite the size of the economy becoming large."
The cabinet approved the issue Monday empowering the field-level government officials to go for higher spending to bring pace in development works.
Regarding discussion during his meeting with the BIAC delegation, established with the assistance of the World Bank's IFC in 2011, he said the Centre has done very well. Especially it has trained a large number of people in arbitration, he said.
He said in Bangladesh people are not interested to go for arbitration though the government has made it mandatory for mediation before going to the court.
"Instead of going for alternative dispute resolution, they want to go to court. Because, you can defer payment for many years by going to the court."
Mr Muhith said he wants to see the Centre functioning very well and contributing to resolution of cases outside courts.
"I shall do my best to see that it functions very well. Some rules can be framed obliging the disputants to follow alternative dispute resolution," he added.
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