Farmers Must Adopt Modern Techniques To Boost Wheat Production: UAF VC

University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF) Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan Monday said that it was need of the hour to boost up per acre production of wheat in order to ensure food security and become self-sufficient in it

SARGODHA, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Nov, 2021 ) :University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF) Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan Monday said that it was need of the hour to boost up per acre production of wheat in order to ensure food security and become self-sufficient in it.

Addressing a farmer convention here, he said that the country was importing three million tons of wheat worth Rs 175 billion. He said that precious foreign exchange could be saved by adopting modern techniques to get a bumper yield per acre.

The VC said that the UAF, in collaboration with Agriculture, Extension Department Punjab had sent 22,000 students in the field of the five divisions of the province to equip farming community with latest wheat production techniques for nine days. He said progressive farmers were getting wheat yields of up to 80 maunds per acre, while our average wheat production is limited to 31 maunds. He was of the view that farmers are in a fix over increasing prices of inputs. However, timely sowing of the crop, balanced use of fertilizers, drill sowing, eradication of weeds and other methods would increase the productivity. He said that under the wheat campaign, they were committed to boosting up production by 10 per cent per acre.

He said that the Agriculture Department should emphasise the irrigation schedule and motivate farmers not to over irrigate fields and save precious water. He also said that the country was losing 15 percent of production during harvesting through outdated combine harvester.

Therefore, it should be replaced with sophisticated harvesting machines.

Principal Officer PRP UAF Dr Muhammad Jalal Arif said that the university, in collaboration with the Agriculture Department (Extension), had launched a campaign on the directive of Punjab Agriculture Minister Syed Hussain Jahania Gardezi and Secretary Agriculture Asad Rehman Gilani to uplift the farm production. He said that the UAF VC was personally monitoring the campaign and motivating all stakeholders for good results.

Director Agriculture Extension Malik Faiz Muhammad Kundi said that 4,000 students of the UAF had been going village to village in Sargodha. He said that the government was committed to agriculture sector, which was backbone of our economy.

Agriculture Officer Hafiz Abdul Wahab said that balanced use of fertilizers must be ensured by the farming community to increase crop productivity.