On Wednesday, June 5th, hundreds of wheat farmers held a protest in front of the Khuzestan Governor’s Office in Ahvaz, demanding payment for their crops.
According to reports the government owes farmers millions of dollars.
During the protest state security forces attempted to disperse the protesting farmers.
The state-run IRNA news agency reported that the wheat farmers, holding placards, protested the non-payment of their claims. It quoted Azim Sathi-Nejad, a representative of the protesting farmers, saying that they had delivered the wheat to the Grain Administration on April 20th, and according to the law, the payments should have been made within 24 hours of delivery.
According to the report, Mohammad Razi Jalali, Deputy Coordinator of Economic Affairs of the Khuzestan Governorate, promised some of these farmers that their payments would be made next week. This promise was made while on the same day, Ali Bahadori Jahromi, the government spokesperson, said, “The necessary resources for settling the purchased guaranteed wheat from the farmers have been allocated so that the payments can be made swiftly, and we aim to pay all the wheat costs within the first six months.”
However, in contradictory statements, Alireza Mohajer, Deputy Minister of Agriculture, said on the same day that the payment for the wheat sold at the guaranteed price to the government would begin next week.
In the promises of these two regime officials, no mention was made of the amount of debt that needs to be paid to the wheat farmers.
Meanwhile, according to the state-run Young Journalists Club (YJC), Attaollah Hashemi, head of the National Wheat Farmers Foundation, said, “From March 30th until today, about 1.35 million tons of wheat worth approximately 220 trillion rials (approximately $367 million) have been purchased from wheat farmers, but not a single rial has been paid.”
In this context, on June 1, Shargh newspaper quoted Ali Gholi Imani, head of the Wheat Farmers Empowerment Foundation, as saying, “Since the beginning of the harvest season, 2.7 million tons of wheat from farmers in 12 provinces have been purchased, valued at over 460 trillion rials (approximately $767 million), but only 23 trillion rials (approximately $38.3 million), or about five percent, of the farmers’ claims have been paid.”
The regime’s ISNA news agency also wrote on Wednesday that the value of wheat purchased by the government is around 400 trillion rials (approximately $666.6 million), of which only 23 trillion rials has been paid.
Referring to the heavy government debt to wheat farmers, Shargh added that this situation “has made them indebted and dependent on brokers because the government’s annual delays in paying farmers have caused liquidity shortages, delaying planting cycles, and consequently, disrupting and disorganizing the agricultural product market.”
According to Shargh, farmers say that they have set late May and June as the time for harvesting their crops to pay their loan installments to the banks, but now the government has not paid for their crops, and the banks have imposed late payment penalties on them, putting pressure on the farmers.
The newspaper wrote: A large number of farmers, after harvesting spring wheat, need to plant their second crop, but they do not have the necessary liquidity to buy pesticides, fertilizers, seeds, etc., and the timing for planting their second crop has been delayed.
Shargh noted that this issue has caused the average working age of farmers to exceed 57 to 58 years, and young people no longer have an interest in entering the agricultural sector.
In recent years, the guaranteed purchase price of wheat has been a contentious issue between the government and wheat farmers.
