Union Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh calls for closer collaboration between India and UK on the issue of Sustainable Food Production
#FoodProduction #Sustainable #FoodDistributionUnderlining that the global pattern of food production and distribution may need to shift significantly as climate change progresses, Dr Jitendra Singh called for joint funding to develop a coherent and stakeholder-relevant R&D program that will address this challenge
January 2022 : Addressing the joint India-UK meet on “Sustaining Food Production under Environmental Stress”, through virtual mode, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Science & Technology; Minister of State (Independent Charge) Earth Sciences; MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh called for collaboration between the two nations on issues of mutual concern like achieving the goals of food security and zero hunger. The Workshop is being organized jointly by National Agri-Food Biotechnology Institute (NABI), Mohali, a institute under Department of Biotechnology, Government of India and University of Birmingham, UK and supported by Newton Bhabha Fund and British Council.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, India-UK joint collaboration may include programmes like students exchange, basic research, technology development, product development as well as product/process demonstration and their implementation in joint collaboration. Dwelling on the issue of Sustainable Food Production, Dr Jitendra Singh said, the South Asian region is facing the shrinking arable land, besides the problem of global climate change that needs to be addressed. Quoting World Bank data, the Minister pointed out that the arable land in South Asia was reported at 43.18% in 2018 which has been stagnant since the early 1970s and recently declining. He said, growth in yields and more intensive use of land will account for all of the growth in crop production and will also compensate for losses in the arable land area.
Underlining that the global pattern of food production and distribution may need to shift significantly as climate change progresses, Dr Jitendra Singh called for joint funding to develop a coherent and stakeholder-relevant R&D program that will address this challenge. He said, the initiative by the British Council to support such interactive meet among the researchers with a common goal will seek attention from the stakeholders and nurture the young investigators to provide them with an excellent platform to share and rear the ideas.
Dr Jitendra Singh noted with satisfaction that this workshop is meant to bring the scientists across the two countries including 22 outstanding experts in the theme areas from both UK and India, that is, 20 young investigators from both the countries working on a range of important crops in relation to climate change. The Minister suggested evolving important key areas in agriculture, food and nutrition to be taken by the two countries for joint research plans.
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