Online Certificate Course On Micropropagation Of Quality Banana Held

COMSTECH, in collaboration with International Center for Chemical and Biological Sciences (ICCBS) and Pakistan Biotechnology Information Center, Karachi Chapter Thursday organized an online certificate course on "Micropropagation of Quality Banana Plant for Commercial Purpose".

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 25th Nov, 2021 ) :COMSTECH, in collaboration with International Center for Chemical and Biological Sciences (ICCBS) and Pakistan Biotechnology Information Center, Karachi Chapter Thursday organized an online certificate course on "Micropropagation of Quality Banana Plant for Commercial Purpose".

Prof Dr M Iqbal Choudhary, Coordinator General, COMSTECH said in this welcome address that this capacity building event is focused on Banana, which is considered as cash crop.

Banana is a staple crop in many countries in west Africa and central Africa as well as south America.

It is a very important crop which brings lots of revenue to many countries. Bananas are prone to diseases, he mentioned.

Prof Choudhary said that we have seen in many countries that bananas have been wiped out because of various viruses and different kinds of diseases.

He said tissue culture technique is very easy to perform by even farmers with little training.

He said tissue culture technology provides virus free germplasm which helps protecting plants from diseases and enhancing their quality.

Prof Choudhary also informed that COMSTECH has a major agriculture programme and is working jointly with Islamic Organization of Food Security on different aspects of food security and agriculture.

The course comprised a lecture and an online training session covering, overview of plant tissue culture and its applications, equipment and media used, explant selection, sterilization, initiation, multiplication, shooting and rooting.

The course was attended by more than 350 interested scientists and research scholars working in various fields of plant biotechnology.

Dr Paul Chege of Afri-Center, International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications ISAAA delivered the lecture.