Faisalabad January 11, 2010 ( ) There is a need to enhance our agricultural production by utilizing all given water and land resources to meet the food requirement of our growing population, said University of Agriculture Vice Chancellor Dr. Iqrar Ahmad Khan.

Dr. Iqrar addressed the inaugural session of one day workshop on "ACIAR Project Activities 2009" organised by the Water Management Research Centre UAF in collaboration with International Centre of Water for Food Security, Charles Sturt University Australia and PIDA Pakistan at STC Hall on Monday.

Dr. Iqrar said that 150 years ago, Faisalabad, was a deserted land and then transformed into a green land thanks to the establishment of world largest canal system given by then British rulers. He said the university wass striving hard to transform the existing land and irrigation resources into an efficient and economized use of inputs so as to reap the long term benefits of sustainable development.

He said UAF spawn the prosperity by providing a fresh blood of young and robust manpower aiming at equipping the farmers with latest agricultural practices. Dr. Iqrar while highlighting the water significance stressed the need to make efficient use of all agricultural inputs to enhance the production of growing population. Dr. Khan while applauding the contributions of WMRC said that during the last 30 years, the centre successfully organized various workshops and seminars to sensitise the masses about growing water scarcity and environmental problems. Commenting on his recent visit to Australia the vice chancellor said that there was a need to learn many things from Australians "I submitted my Australian visit report to governor who is likely to visit Australia shortly" he added.

Dr. Iqrar A. Khan said the HEC was pursing the idea to create specialized research groups in all the universities to deal with their respective domains. Dr. Khan appreciated the efforts of Charles Sturt University Australia and emphasized for more coordinated and integrated approach to deal with the challenges confronting both the countries. Earlier, Prof. Dr. Mohsin Hafeez, Director, International Centre of Water for Food Security (IC Water), Charles Sturt University Australia and project leader ACIAR said that we should take steps to double our agricultural production. He said that Pakistan was facing multi furious agricultural challenges right from farm to distributaries, market and handling. He said in Australia, water scarcity reached upto 10% in 2007-08 and Australians were very much aware of the fact to deal with the threat of water shortage.

Prof. Dr. Rai Niaz Ahmad co-coordinator ACIAR project and Director WMRC UAF said that like others parts of the world, Pakistan is also facing irrigation water shortage. He said pressure is increasing on our groundwater which is not sustainable and may affect productivity of land and crop as increasing use of low quality groundwater will put us in secondary Stalinization. "In Pakistan, groundwater resources vary from fresh to poor and its distribution is like that the head has mostly fresh or better water quality than the tail" he added. He said that other pertinent scenario exists here with the surface water supply is the inequity of water distribution among the water users. Dr. Niaz told that after passing the PIDA Act from Punjab Assembly in 1997, the existing provincial irrigation departments have been transferred to PIDA to make policy level decisions and acquisition and subsequent distribution of water to ensure equity and reliability in irrigation service delivery. Dr. Muhammad Irshad conducted the programme.