Speakers at an international seminar held here on Tuesday said that holistic approach of biodiversity was necessary to achieve the aims of conservation, sustainable use and equitable benefit sharing of biological resources.
The two-day international conference titled Biodiversity Conservation as Renewable Resource of Pakistan has been jointly organised by University of Arid Agriculture (UAAR) and Higher Education Commission (HEC).
Main objectives of the conference are to strengthen the knowledge of existing manpower in the area of biodiversity, enhance scientific collaboration among scientists within and outside the country. It would help identify the status of different marine and terrestrial organisms in Pakistan and help understand future problems arising due to human interventions in Pakistan.
Speaking as the chief guest at the inaugural session of the conference, Director, Biodiversity, Ministry of Environment, Dr Syed Nasir Mehmood stressed upon the participants to widen the focus of priorities on the broad subject areas of biological conservation for fulfilling the national commitments.
He said there was dire need that experts divert their attention towards Taxonomy and Access and Benefits Sharing (ABS), arguing that ABS has the potential to help alleviate poverty through a system of claiming shares from the multinational pharmaceuticals in lieu of the traditional knowledge of our local communities.
He said that biodiversity encompasses many disciplines like agriculture forestry, fisheries, livestock, poultry, marine, wildlife and biotechnology, arguing that well co-ordinated actions were needed to address all these subjects so as to achieve the aims of conservation, sustainable use and equitable benefit sharing.
Naseer urged upon the researchers to bridge gapes between themselves and focus on co-ordinated efforts for proper utilisation of biological resources.
Earlier, Dean faculty of sciences, UAAR, Dr Afsar Mian presented the welcome address and informed the audience about works and achievements of the university. He lauded the efforts of the university and HEC for organising such workshops for public interest.
He expressed the hope that the participants would come out with healthy recommendation for promotion of biodiversity. It may be recalled that the two-day moot has been organised to provide an opportunity to university teachers, students and researchers to interact with national and international experts to exchange and promote knowledge and expertise.
Biodiversity experts from all across the country and abroad are participating in the conference. The participants are likely to come out with concrete suggestions and recommendations for the promotion of biodiversity at the concluding session to be held on Wednesday.
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