Most of the food and crop strategies over the past years focused on yield and protection of crops but very little has been really done on breeds for high nutrition crops across the globe having two billion nutrition-deficient children. Keeping this in view, we have to develop and promote high nutrient crops breeds to cope with food crises.
This was stated by speakers at the inaugural session of international conference titled "Applied Genetics and Biotechnology", at the videoconference room, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad. The moot was presided over by Vice Chancellor, Professor Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan while Professor Kousar A Malik from FC University Lahore was the chief guest on the occasion. The event was organised by Centre of Agricultural Biochemistry and Biotechnology and Office of Research, Innovation and Commercialisation, UAF.
Addressing the gathering, Professor Dr Iqrar said that food-insecure people in Pakistan in 2010-11 were 77 million and malnourished people were 45 million. He said the world population is seven billion while its population by 2050 will be 9.4 billion. Now we have to shift our focus on producing more food keeping in view nutrition requirement.
He said crop improvement through conventional breeding would not be sufficient to meet the challenge of increasing food demand due to the ever-growing population. "We have to adopt the new technologies like Genetic Engineering and strengthen our existing crop improvement system". He pointed out that India has made a tremendous progress in biotechnology. He said that in Pakistan we have thin manpower in the said field so tangible steps should be taken in this regard. He stressed the need to integrate modern researches with industry.
Professor Dr Kousar A Malik stressed the need to increase the pace of work on biotechnology as he said that Pakistan, especially its public sector, is lagging far behind in the field. He said that valuable researches are being produced in the country. But, it is a matter of grave concern that little research is being transformed into good and services. We have to work on war footing in this regard, he added.
He called for developing a bridge between the educational institutes and the industry in a bid to increase the productivity of the country. He also urged young scientists and students to come up with innovative ideas and narrow the gap in this regard. USDA Managing Director, Dr Austar Matto in his videoconference said that due to climate changes, downward trend in the production of various crops have been witnessed. He said that it is a serious challenge to feed the growing population of world. He said as the one centigrade of the temperature increased, it reduced agricultural productivity manifold. He said that nutrient-deficient children are facing the deficiency of Vitamin A and Iron. He said that the third world countries lost a large number of crops in the post harvest process that must be addressed.
Dr Roger N Beechy talked about a 'better planet with better food'. He stressed the need to reduce the trend of increasing fertilisers in the country. He called for conserving water as global warming has started playing havoc and water is shrinking. Professor Dr Asif Ali, Director ORIC also spoke on the occasion. Professor Dr Luca Comai from Genome Centre, US Davis, USA briefed the audience about transgenic plants and sustainable agriculture.
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