Faisalabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FCCI), National Textile University (NTU) and National Institute for Biotechnology and Genetics Engineering (NIBGE) are imperative to re-organize the industrial sector on scientific outline.
NIBGE Director Dr Shahid Mansoor put a light that Faisalabad was primarily an agro-industrial city. The NIBGE is working on different crops, including rice.
“It has evolved many new varieties of different crops which are high yielding and have the resistance against different diseases. Pakistan is currently importing edible oil whereas being an agriculture country, we could produce oilseeds locally to fulfill our domestic needs,” he added.
Dr Waheed Khan, principal scientific officer NIBGE, said that biotechnology could improve the fragile items, including vegetables and fruits. He said that the NIBGE had invented many new products and technologies which should be commercialized to bring in its economical benefits.
FCCI president Zia Alumdar Hussain specifically mentioned four major crops wheat, sugarcane, corn and cotton. He said despite being an agriculture country, we are importing pulses, cereals and edible oil whereas our focus is only on the wheat. Wrong selection of crops is our major problem. We could revive our economy by putting the agriculture on the right track,” he said.