President Dr Arif Alvi said the use of information technology (IT) and artificial intelligence (AI) in the agriculture sector were expected to improve the agriculture yield and reduce the production cost in Pakistan.
President said while addressing the inaugural session of National Dialogue on Agriculture held by National Assembly Secretariat. National Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser, federal ministers and parliamentarians also attended the event.
The president said that the national security was connected with the food security.
He further said it was necessary to acquaint the farmers with the latest agriculture research sector in order to accomplish the desired outcomes as increased production cost had badly affected the
He congratulated the NA speaker for the formation of a parliamentary committee on agriculture.
He said though agriculture continued to be the backbone of Pakistan’s economy yet lack of expertise in the sector was an unfortunate which needed to be rectified.
He said 18.5 percent of the country’s population was linked with the agriculture sector but the yield was constantly on decline requiring serious efforts.
He said even the loss of five percentage of the yield affected the growers. He said in order to reduce the losses in fisheries sector, cold storage were established to resolve the problem.
He said the agriculture sector could not continue without water, sunlight, pesticides and fertilizer and called for adoption of sprinkle irrigation instead of flood irrigation to conserve water. He also called for special focus on development of cotton seeds.
The president said Pakistan could also get advantage from the robot technology being used by the world for irrigation and other uses in the agriculture.
He said the government had taken positive steps for improving agriculture sector and emphasized for promotion of cash crops. By encouraging the plantation of olive plants, Pakistan could increase its exports.
The president also stressed for benefiting from research by the newly qualified students of agriculture universities.
He said drastic steps were needed for betterment of the agriculture sector by developing a national census on the subject.
He said despite having huge potential of inland fisheries, the country’s exports could only increase from $300 million in 1999 to $500 million while a neighboring country had touched $10 billion.