State Minister for Food, Agriculture and Livestock Rafiq Ahmad Jamali has said that scientific progress in agriculture will bring radical changes that would help the government to achieve the goals of poverty reduction and food security.
He was speaking in a briefing held here at the ministry of food and agriculture on Sunday. The minister said that the present government was giving top priority to meet the challenges. He urged the experts to realise the full potential of the sector. He said that latest technologies must reach to farmers to maximise the yield per acre.
The minister said that despite substantial development in industrial and services sector, agriculture is still the dominant sector of the country's economy. Farmers, he said, must adopt recommendations of agricultural scientists for making the country self sufficient in food. He said that the government would ensure availability of urea fertiliser for achieving the targets of Rabi crops. Additional secretary Minfal gave a detailed briefing to the minister about various projects being carried out by the ministry and its subordinate departments. He also highlighted the challenges being faced by agriculture sector.
He said that to ensure food security for 160 million population, production of raw material for agro based industries and competitive exportable surplus in a rapidly globalising world, the agriculture sector would have to cope with complying with sanitary and phyto-sanitary requirements of new WTO regime, water scarcity, environmental degradation and climatic change.