ISLAMABAD: The Project “Promotion of Olive Cultivation for Economics Development and Poverty Alleviation” of PARC and National Institute for Genomics and Advanced Biotechnology (NIGAB) signed an agreement here to identify the unknown olive plants available in Pakistan.
The agreement was signed by National Project Director (Olive Promotion) Dr. Muhammad Munir and Project Director (NIGAB) Dr. Muhammad Ramzan Khan here at Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC) Headquarters on Wednesday. Chairman PARC Dr. Iftikhar Ahmad, Italian Technical Director AFNEPAK Project Dr. Ivan Virtousi, Member (Plant Sciences) Dr.Shahid Masood, and other senior PARC scientists witnessed the signing ceremony.
On this occasion, Chairman PARC emphasized the need for establishing nurseries with international standards for provision of disease free plants. He said for this purpose, scientists from PARC and Provinces will be trained in Italy in near future. This will help to provide farmers indigenous disease free and cost effective olive plants. He added that plantation of olive will result to combat edible oil import saving precious forex of billion of Rupees.
According to agreement, both parties will establish research linkages for the project entitled ”Rapid Identification of Olive Cultivars using DNA Markers”. NIGAB is being outsourced for this task through Olive Promotional Project. The total cost of the project is Rs.2.0 million for variety identification of 2000 olive plants through DNA finger printing. The whole project will be completed in a period of 3 months while the plant sampling for DNA extraction will be done from the olive orchards in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), Balochistan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). Varieties identification of 2000 plant samples will be carried out at NIGAB Lab. This will help in identifying orchards in different areas of Pakistan, which then will be utilized as mother orchards for plants propagation.
It was told on the occasion that olive promotion project has five components i.e. four provincial units each at KPK, Balochistan, FATA and Punjab and one Federal Project Management Unit (FPMU) at PARC headquarters. The project is being operated through PARC with a strong coordination system with provinces. The project is producing excellent results and upto now 1300 acres new plantation of olive has been completed utilizing marginal land.
Nine trainings has been arranged and more than three hundred farmers, extentionists, technicians and NGOs people have been trained for olive cultivation, orchards management and value addition. Five nurseries in public sector and 53 in private sector have been established to provide true to type plants for future needs. More than one hundred thousand cuttings have been planted in nurseries. Previously established orchards in public and private sectors are being maintained. Farmer field days are being arranged for popularization of olive in the country.
Comments
Comments are closed.