92 percent of farming community not using certified seeds: UAF vice chancellor

It is a matter of grave concern that as many as 92 percent of farming community does not use certified seeds, which results in low agricultural productivity. This was stated by University of Agriculture Faisalabad Vice Chancellor Professor Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan while talking to a delegation of National Institute of Management Peshawar from 13 the Mid-Career Course, headed by Additional Director Staff Abdul Sattar at Syndicate Hall.
He said it was need of the hour to wean the farming community off the traditional ways to modern trend for the food security. He said effective use of improved seed could result in higher agricultural production and increase net incomes of farming families, which had a positive impact on rural poverty.
He said the country was having 50 million livestock but most of them were under feed that needed attention of the farmers and government. Talking about water issue, he called for building water reservoirs keeping in view that dams store was only 13 MAF of water, whereas flow of water was 105 MAF. "We are dumping the nine times more than our storing water capacity into the sea," he said.
The vice chancellor stressed the need to build water reservoirs in a bid to meet the challenges and combat the flood situation taking the lives of many people every year. Talking about UAF, he said the University allocated seats for admission to Balochistan students remained underutilised.
He stressed the need to fully utilise the provincial seats in a bid to provide quality agricultural education to their inhabitants. He said the university admitted the students on provincial aimed at providing a platform to the students of under-privileged districts as "we cannot make a competition among the students from developed districts and under developed districts."
He said the UAF was the best university in QS across the country according to Higher Education Commission. He said that citation of the university had risen to 3,248 in 2011, while it was 2,045 in 2010. It is one of factors to determine ranking of the university.
He said the university had introduced 15 new degree programmes in a span of four years in order to produce manpower in various areas. All deans and directors were present on the occasion. Meanwhile, delegation of National Institute of Management Peshawar also visited the Faisalabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, where Muzzamil Sultan briefed the visitors about Industrial City especially mismanagement in official institutions.