3 months ago
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Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti connected Friday (February 20, 2026) urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to exclude apples from the projected India-U.S. commercialized woody “to safeguard the interests of Kashmir”.
Ms. Mufti said reports of zero-duty connected American pome imports would present a decease stroke to the orchard system of Kashmir. “Horticulture is the backbone of Kashmir’s economy, supporting implicit 7 lakh families whose livelihoods, children’s education, and healthcare beryllium wholly connected it,” Ms. Mufti said.
She demanded that the authorities exclude apples from the India-U.S. commercialized list, clasp astatine slightest 50% import work to guarantee a level playing field, strictly enforce Minimum Import Price mechanisms, and supply targeted subsidies, casual credit, and infrastructure enactment to section growers.
“If the Centre fails to act, lakhs of orchard families volition beryllium pushed into irreversible fiscal distress,” Ms. Mufti said.
She said the Kashmir horticulture assemblage was “already bleeding owed to low-priced Iranian imports routed done South Asian Free Trade Area, which person depressed marketplace prices and weakened request for section produce”.
“Flooding our markets with heavy subsidised American apples volition trigger a terms warfare we cannot win. The structural disadvantages faced by section growers including clime uncertainty, anemic proviso chains, and precocious proscription costs contrasting it with the monolithic subsidies enjoyed by American farmers,” Ms. Mufti said.
She said protecting Kashmiri apples was “not protectionism”. “It is astir safeguarding livelihoods, heritage, and the dignity of farming,” Ms. Mufti said.
