I congratulate the agriculture scientists, researchers and staff of the Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC) for celebrating 25 years of success.
Investment in agriculture sector is of fundamental importance to our country in that it provides 22% of GDP, employs about 42% of the labour force and provides livelihood to more than 60% of the population living in rural areas. The thrust of our national agricultural policy is to increase investment in agriculture research and development as a means of broad-based economic growth and poverty reduction. Food security stands at the core of our policy, which very much reflects the importance of PARC as the national apex body for agriculture research in Pakistan.
To boost investment in the agricultural sector, our government has allocated substantial funds to agriculture in the Public Sector Development Program. The investment in agriculture infrastructure, research and extension, and livelihood improvement activities are accorded high priority. For this purpose, a wide range of projects have been undertaken to improve farm productivity, efficiency and competitiveness of agriculture sector.
In order to save water losses, a mega project was launched in 2004-05 with an amount of Rs 66 billion. Another mega project costing Rs 16 billion will be started this year for improving water use efficiency and crop productivity through promotion of high efficiency irrigation systems. In addition, a number of projects for livelihood improvement of poor and small farmers, agri-business development and strengthening of agriculture research have been launched this year.
We are paying special attention to the development of the livestock sub-sector. In this regard, a comprehensive livestock policy has already been approved. Several livestock projects have either been started or are in the pipeline, covering divergent areas including strengthening of livestock services and dairy development as well as the Prime Minister's Special Initiative on Livestock.
In addition, projects costing Rs 3.0 billion are being launched to enhance community-driven milk and dairy production and to increase red meat production. Likewise, major interventions are planned to promote the development of fisheries and horticultural corps, value chain and supply chains with emphasis on small holders; these are all private-sector led initiatives. PARC has played an important role in promoting science-based cost-effective state of the art technologies.
Its contributions to development and dissemination of green revolution technologies, food security and poverty reduction are recognised nationally and globally. I am pleased to note that PARC has undertaken a major restructuring exercise and is implementing a reform agenda to meet the challenges of food security, poverty reduction and sustainable natural resource management in 21st Century. I wish PARC all success in its endeavors to promote science-based agriculture to make agriculture and rural sector more productive, self reliant and competitive.