Fact-check: Claims of only barren land being leased for corporate farming are false

Government officials have repeatedly claimed that the state land being leased out for the corporate agricultural farming initiative in Punjab is entirely barren, which will then be developed to address Pakistan’s food security challenges.

This claim is incorrect. Some of the recent land allocated in Punjab is in fact fertile, documents reveal.

Claim

In February last year, the Director General Strategic Projects of the Pakistan Army wrote to the Punjab Board of Revenue, requesting that the then interim Punjab government lease thousands of acres of “waste barren” state land in the province to the Green Pakistan Initiative, a collaborative effort between the Pakistan Army and the government, for its corporate farming initiative to improve food security in the country.

This document was later submitted by the Punjab government to the Lahore High Court after approving the transfer of land.

More recently, on August 9, Minister for National Food Security and Research Rana Tanveer Hussain reiterated in the National Assembly that 4.8 million acres of “barren land” across Pakistan had been identified for lease to a company for corporate farming under the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) directive. The minister further defended the initiative, asserting that developing purported barren land would expand cultivation areas in the country.

While a senior government official later confirmed to The News that most of this state land is located in Punjab.

Fact

Recent documents contradict the government’s claim that all the land leased for the corporate farming initiative is barren. In Punjab, some of this state land is, in fact, fertile and already under cultivation.

The corporate agriculture farming project is part of the Green Pakistan Initiative.

Late last year, the Punjab Agricultural Department wrote to the Board of Revenue, approving the lease of 497 acres of state land in Arifwala tehsil, Pakpattan district, to a Green Pakistan Initiative company for corporate agricultural farming.

While another official document dated February 20 confirmed that the public land being handed over is farmland. It stated that of the 497 acres in Arifwala, only 27 acres consist of roads and buildings. It also noted that the land will be handed over to the Green Pakistan Initiative after the Rabi crops are harvested by April 30, 2024, further showing that the land was already under cultivation.

Mir Rumman Khalil, assistant commissioner of Arifwala tehsil, confirmed to Geo Fact Check that the area is cultivated with “agricultural crops,” apart from some residential sections.

“There is no barren land here,” he said.

Two local farmers also corroborated this, noting that the area is irrigated by water from the 3-L canal. They shared photos of their crops with Geo Fact Check as proof.

As of now, farmers in Pakpattan have taken legal action, challenging the Punjab government’s decision to lease the state land for corporate farming. Petitioners in the Lahore High Court argue that their families have been cultivating the land for the state since 1928.

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