MULTAN - Kisan (farmer)  card, a novel technological intervention set into motion by Prime Minister Imran Khan in Multan on Apr 26, 2021, is actually a one-click single remedy to all troubles farming community had been facing since long.
The prime minister has triggered an agriculture revolution in the making, said south Punjab secretary agriculture Saqib Ali Ateel in a telephonic talk with APP.
“It would free farmers from multi-step verification processes for subsidies making these accessible in a single step,” Saqib said. It has also cleared the doubt smokescreen on direct subsidies; he said adding that farmers used to complain of hard or no access to direct subsidies which are now accessible under Kisan cards.
Director agriculture extension Multan division said that initially the main focus of the Kisan cards was to reduce the cost of production of farmers and make modern agriculture accessible and profitable for them. However, since the prime minister also announced agriculture loans and crop insurance under Kisan card initiative, these two would soon be incorporated under the mechanism, and more banks should be extending Kisan card services to farmers in addition to HBL. Kisan cards would enable farmers to get fertilisers of different kinds, pesticides, and pure registered seed varieties of wheat, cotton, pulses including moong, gram, and oilseeds like sesame, sunflower and other crops at highly subsidised price, he maintained. 
The procedure for Kisan cards is simple. Farmers first need to get them registered with agriculture extension department and then move to the HBL Konnect shop for thumb verification to get their account opened. They would also need to deposit Rs 500 that would be returned to their accounts later. Almost 70 per cent of our population is associated with agriculture directly or indirectly and any impact on farming community reflects on a larger segment of population. Progressive farmer and businessman Shahid Naseem Khokhar hailed the initiative as purely a farmer-friendly project, and stressed on expanding it to other provinces with more facilities incorporated.
A Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf leader from Jahanian Chaudhry Ghulam Sarwar explored a new dimension saying the Kisan cards would end the painful episodes of bribery and delaying tactics and enable farmers avail the benefits directly and without any trouble. Shahbaz, a farmer from Shujabad expressed gratitude to the prime minister Imran Khan and chief minister Sardar Usman Buzdar for launching the scheme from south Punjab adding that it would make quality seed, fertilisers and pesticides available to farmers at low price and would help increase production of cotton, wheat and other crops.
Another farmer Qadir Bakhsh told APP it was a revolutionary scheme that would bring a turnaround in lifestyle of farming community.
Agri Forum Pakistan’s south Punjab representative Rao Afsar said the scheme was still in the initial phase adding that more room would be available soon for modifications with the rise in level of awareness among the farmers.
He stressed on frequent training sessions of registered dealers at village and union council level to strengthen the scheme at grass root level.
“The scheme was gaining popularity among farmers by each passing day,” said Shahzad Sabir adding he himself saw dozens of farmers in queue outside an HBL outlet waiting for their turn in Khanewal few days ago.
Agriculture secretary south Punjab said Kisan card scheme became operational on April 29, adding that hundreds of farmers were contacting agriculture department and HBL to get their konnect accounts opened.
The scheme also benefit farmers in another way, he said adding it plugged chances of corruption and would enable farmers make those accountable who dare to sell substandard or fake agriculture implements.
He said that electronic transactions through Kisan cards record name of the out let, the brand, batch number and farmers would be able to get that traceable information from the data and initiate action against the wrongdoers even if he had not issued a receipt.