Winning CoL war

Saturday, 8 January 2011 00:01 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

FOR years Sri Lanka suffered under a cruel war. After the war was won by the Army, it is now being deployed for an entirely different cause, but with as much importance for everyone – the war against the cost of living.

As a country that has gotten used to depending on the Army to save it, it seems that the common solution to problems is ‘when in doubt, call the Army’. From the Urban Development Authority being placed under the Defence Ministry to the Army being used to clear up unauthorised dwellings, the armed forces are being used in the fight for development. Pragmatic as this may be, it also raises questions over why this is necessary.

The latest quest for the Army is to collect vegetables from farmers around their numerous camps and transport them to Colombo and other urban areas to be sold at selected outlets. The Army will not keep a profit or charge transport charges or make any other additions to the prices. However, since the entire enterprise is funded by public money, there is a payment that is indirectly extracted from the people.

The decision to use the Army as a vegetable supplier has raised several queries and amused statements from different quarters, with one person even going to the extent of suggesting that if the Army can be used to supply vegetables, then their services can be expanded to growing them as well while the Navy can be used to supply fish. All that remains is to find a task for the Air Force; perhaps they can supply auxiliary services and spray the crops.

Flippancy aside, the fact that the President had to take such serious measures to reduce the cost of living shows that there is a significant lapse in the mechanisms put in place to provide produce to people. Where are the officials of the relevant ministries, research organisations and cultivation boards and what are they doing?

Agriculture, fisheries and trade, along with a host of other sectors, should be seriously examined to find out the cause of such a vegetable shortage and why prices are being increased by middlemen. The farmers are seeing little benefit and consumers at the other end of the link are feeling the stick even more. Despite the end of the festive season, prices have remained the same and few believe that significant relief will be found in the Government’s stop-gap imports.

So what is the solution? Imports and using the Army as a supply mechanism is clearly a short-term measure. Just like the Government deployed the Army to end the war decisively, it must also use its resources to properly plan and implement a lasting solution to the cost of living crisis. Obviously there will be points when plans will fail and adjustments will have to be made, but overall Sri Lanka cannot reach food security if it does not become at least partially self-reliant on essential food items and use resources to formulate a proper supply and dissemination system.

As the Army well knows, no operation is successful unless all the different ranks and regiments work together. The fight against the cost of living is no different. The Government must initiate a comprehensive strategy to assist farmers and improve network systems so that the cost of living war can be successfully combated.