UN envoy urges int’l groups to take notice of Ravi Park

[Lahore_Real_Estate]

* Schutter urges rights organisations to take notice of Punjab govt’s plans to lease barren land to foreign investors, as these moves will be in violation of basic human rights

* Says such projects will increase poverty, inequality in the societies if not taken care of in time

* Govt schemes will pose huge problems for citizens and local farmers

By Afnan Khan

BERLIN/LAHORE: UN Special Rapporteur on The Right to Food Olivier De Schutter has urged the international rights organisations to take notice of projects of the Punjab government like the Ravi National Park (RNP) and plans to lease barren land to foreign investors as these moves might be in violation of basic human rights.

He said this while talking to Daily Times during a conference with journalists from different countries in Berlin. Schutter, while commenting on the Punjab government’s plans to lease agricultural and urban land to foreigners, reportedly from the Arab world, to utilise it for agricultural and industrial purposes, said, “Unfortunately there are more bad practices than good practices around. I urge the international human rights bodies to carefully scrutinise what is happening, and to recognise the links between access to land and rights such as the right to food, the right to housing, and the right to work.”

Commenting on another project to lease barren land in Punjab to foreigners to run agricultural and farming projects by the government, Schutter also showed concerns that such projects will increase poverty and inequality in the societies if not taken care of in time.

He said, “Land does not go to the most efficient producers, it goes to those who have capital and who can afford it. The result if things are left unchecked will be more inequality and poverty.”

Commenting on the fact that Gulf States, China, South Korea and other major economic powers of the world buying land in different countries, mainly present in Africa and Asia, the UN special rapporteur said that most of these investments occur with a complete lack of transparency, without proper consultation of the local communities concerned, and they will benefit investors and perhaps some of the local elites – but they will create much less employment, and contribute much less to rural development, than would policies supporting small farmers and ensuring their access to land.

He added that there are important opportunity costs involved, the land that is given away to investors is land that will not be available to promote small-scale farming, although the poverty-reducing potential of the latter is much more important.

Daily Times had reported in the past about the fact that the government had issued a notification with the name of RNP scheme on April 23, 2009 while banning all kinds of construction and development on the private land of the citizens comprising 216 villages, 1,000 mosques, 200 schools, 200 graveyards and 140,438 acres of fertile agricultural land in five different tehsils namely Lahore, Sharaqpur, Ferozewala and Muridke.

Moreover, the government later introduced another project called Khadar Area Project after facing immense pressure and protests by hundreds of thousands of people who were becoming the victims of this land-grabbing project. The Khadar Area Project was aiming to grab 500,000 kanals of land in the same area and put similar restrictions as the RNP did.

However, Daily Times has now learnt that both the projects were still intact in the papers, but the government machinery including the local patwaris and town administrations have backtracked from the idea of interfering in development works as they faced severe resistance and protests during a couple of times when they tried to demolish or halt the construction work on the private properties of people.

Government officials had also mentioned the fact that the sword of both the schemes was still hanging on the heads of innocent citizens as none of the notifications issued by the Punjab government were withdrawn and the government might make another attempt to occupy the land from the citizens at the ‘right time’.

The residential and agricultural areas that will fall prey to the schemes include areas situated in Lahore Khas (Ravi Town), Shahdara and other areas of Shahdara Town, Sanda and parts of Data Gunj Bukhsh and Samanabad Town, Nawan Kot, Maraka, parts of urban and rural Thokar Niaz Baig, Chung and some areas from Allama Iqbal Town, Bhaseen, Lakhodhair, Baghbanpura and other parts of Wahga and Shalimar towns.

The government had even set up teams of district officers, enforcement officers, revenue officers, girdawars, patwaris, environment officers and town officers of the areas concerned to start vigilance and monitoring of assigned areas and take action against the owner of a private land if he or she tries to develop structures on their property.

The teams were also asked to monitor any violations of the government set rules and file proper reports to the district coordination officer (DCO) office on a daily basis. The authorities had given the task of demolishing and removal of any illegal structure with the help of police, town officers and concerned staff, registering FIRs against the landowners and issuing notices to them.

A copy of the under discussion notification about Khadar Area Project was also sent to the Punjab local governments secretary, secretary environment, commissioner, executive district officers EDOs, district officers (DOs) and other officers.

The residents have stated that the project will not only violate the basic rights of the citizens, but also create water-related problems, as the investors will be using the irrigation water given to the farmers of Punjab while they will be producing crops for their own countries or the international market.

They have also mentioned that people will be forced to come on the streets if the government did not shelve these projects and cancel the notifications because it would not be possible for anybody to throw 1.3 million people out of their houses.

However, Senior Adviser to Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Zulfiqar Khan Khosa told Daily Times that the Punjab government has already given 800 acres of land to the foreign investors in Cholistan region and they will be doing farming related jobs on the land.