ISLAMABAD:Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Farrukh Habib on Friday said the government was working on targeted subsidies to provide maximum relief to the downtrodden segments of society.
The minister, in a series of tweets, said the government had given around Rs 30 billion subsidy through the Utility Stores Corporation (USC) from January 2020 to June 2021 to reduce the burden of his prices of essential items on the low income group people.
The basic consumer items like wheat, flour, sugar and ghee were available at 15-18 per cent lower than the market rate at more than 4,900 USC outlets across the country, he added.
He said according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, the overall global inflation had jumped to 40 per cent while edible oil prices had gone up by 124 percent.
The minister said the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz regime had doled out subsidy of Rs 850 million in one year (2017-18) and on the contrary the PTI government spent around Rs 25 billion on that count last year (2020-21).
Farrukh said the National Radio and Telecommunication Corporation (NRTC) had been tasked to digitize some 4,000 Utility Stores to ensure provision of subsidized items to the people in a transparent manner.
He said the government had fixed ex-mill rate of sugar at Rs 70 per kilogram and market price at Rs 88.24 per kg.