Pakistani, Egyptian academia join hands to establish ‘Dairy Science Park Cairo’

PESHAWAR: The Academy for Scientific Research and Technology (ASRT) Egypt and Dairy Science Park (DSP) Peshawar have joined hands for establishing a joint project of Dairy Science Park Cairo (DSPC).

A formal memorandum of understanding (MoU) between both organizations would be signed to give practical shape to the establishment of the DSPC will be signed shortly between DSP and ASRT for establishing DSPC and mutual cooperation in future.

Dr Abdul Rehman Ilyas, Advisor to ASRT President, Government of Egypt for Technology Innovations and Collaborations had desired the establishment of the Dairy Science Cairo (DSPC), a joint project of Academy for Scientific Research and Technology (ASRT) and Dairy Science Park Peshawar Pakistan. He is the co-founder of DSP along with Prof M Subhan Qureshi. Dr Amr Faroukh Abdelkhalik Vice President and Mahmoud Sakr President ASRT have endorsed the proposal.

Professor Dr Subhan Qureshi, founder of the DSP Peshawar has said that under the experience of the DSP under Good Governance and Policy Reforms (2011-2023) suggesting two techno-parks under FAO-UN and ITC-UN national consultancies.

He said that Dairy Science Park Cairo (DSPC) will be established as an autonomous regulatory, financial and marketing authority, run by a Board of Governors representing all the stakeholders and an Endowment Fund. DSPC will support the public sector organizations as facilitators and the academia in generation of feasible entrepreneurship models across the Livestock based Value Chain (LBVC).

The Major task of DSPC would be generation of decent employment and exportable hygienic/Halal certified food and biotech products.

In a communiqué, Dr Ilyas has said that he had founded Prof. Subhan Qureshi a truly committed scientist with a deep empathy towards the livestock and dairy farming community of the province of Pakhtunkhwa and Pakistan at large.” He said that the deep understanding of the problems and aspiration by Professor Qureshi to find innovative solutions can attract the attention of donors and policy makers so that the needed resource base is generated to impact incomes and livelihoods of the poor dairy farmers as well as strengthen the scientific environment to benefit the students.

As a development professional and institutional innovation expert, he said they have shared their experiences and deliberated on the idea of Dairy Science Park – an enabling platform which will bring all the stakeholders together to deliberate problems and issues and find sustainable solutions by optimizing resource use. He said that they have discussed the process out of my experience on Agri-Science Park and tried to embed the dairy and livestock sectors to it.

The journey from consultation workshops, conferences, proposal preparations to institutionalization of the initiative as a full-fledged platform called ‘Dairy Science Park’ is an amazing case study for development experts. It could have only happened with the zeal and commitment of Prof. Qureshi and team and the policy makers who believed and substantiated the required political will in shaping Dairy Science Park. The various training programs organized, partnership development efforts, advocacy with the Government and mapping of program streams is an achievement in itself.

He said that research innovation and its uptake in the Information Technology and life sciences sectors, the process is pretty established and platforms are readily available for a ‘seeker’ (innovation seeker, entrepreneur, researcher etc) to look at commercialization strategies and get the required support from ‘providers’ (Universities, Research Institutions, Donors, VC/PE partners etc).

The same impetus and institutional innovation is required for Agriculture and its allied sectors such as dairy, fisheries, forestry etc. Such innovations are happening across the globe in different formats with nemesis as incubators, platforms, accelerators, innovation centres etc with a core belief of bringing the stakeholder ecosystem to come together and find solutions to issues and problems in a cohesive way. The initiative of Dairy Science Park is one such kind an early establisher of institutional innovation practice in the dairy sector, setting a learning trend for others.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023