Government has missed the targets set in the rural affairs sector and this was creating chaos, so much so that last January government had been unable to open the grading station at Ta’ Qali, Labour MP Noel Farrugia said in a statement yesterday.

This meant that local products were at a disadvantage when sold here as they face competition from imported products, he added.

Vegetable boxes were not being cleaned and farmers had to get help from their wives to wash them.

Government was investing millions in this sector but the results are nowhere to be seen. The people should know, Mr Farrugia insisted, when the faming sector would again guarantee 7,000 tonnes of processed chicken meat every year, among other examples.

He condemned government’s cutting down of 40 per cent of the subsidy given to Maltese and Gozitan farmers who breed live fowl and, worse than this, 50 per cent of the subsidy promised to farmers for vegetables and fruits produced for the local market.

Mr Farrugia demanded that government makes public its contingency plan for the pork industry. This is because private abattoirs had closed, work at the Gozo abattoir had been suspended and therefore the pork industry depended solely on the Marsa abattoir.