LAHORE: At least 16 research projects of agriculture and livestock departments worth over Rs343 million were approved at a meeting of the Punjab Agriculture Research Board (PARB) here on Monday.

Of them six projects costing Rs180m related to the agriculture department. These included research on preparing heat-tolerant flower varieties for export purposes and reverse engineering of some farm tools.

Ten projects worth Rs160.88m related to the livestock sector.

Agriculture Minister Syed Hussain Jehanian Gardezi, who chaired the PARB meeting, urged that results of the research must reach the doorsteps of farmers so that their cost of production could be reduced and increase in per acre yield could be ensured.

He said agricultural scientists would have to play their constructive role for increasing national production.

He said agriculture plans needed to be implemented on a commercial scale which would not only increase profit of the farmers but also meet the domestic demand and stabilise prices of agricultural produce.

Agriculture Secretary Asad Rehman Gillani called for result-oriented research to develop varieties that could increase profits of the farming community.

He directed PARB Chief Executive Dr Abid Mahmood to present a detailed report on the results of the research projects so far executed with PARB funding.

Kissan Ittehad President Khalid Khokhar urged that local flower varieties should be preferred for developing new heat-tolerant varieties.

MPA Syed Khawar Shah, Mrs Shahida Ahmad and other members participated in the meeting.

Published in Dawn, December 21st, 2021