26 August 2011
No. 1481
Dr William Dar addressing the participants of the 2nd Asian PGPR Conference in Beijing, China.
ICRISAT in the 2nd Asian PGPR Conference
Harnessing bio-products for sustainable agriculture Today’s global challenges are getting bigger, making daunting demands on agriculture to address worldwide food and energy security, food safety, human health, environmental sustainability, and improved livelihoods of smallholder farmers.
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ddressing the issue of producing more and better food for a ballooning global population, Director General William Dar spoke at the 2ndAsian Plant Growth-Promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) Conference held on 21-24 August in Beijing, China. In his keynote address, Dr Dar emphasized the vital role of PGPR-based products such as bio-fertilizers and bio-pesticides for sustainable agriculture. “Clearly, further increases in food production must be generated by the sustained use of ecologically sound, socially equitable, economically viable, and environmentally sustainable technologies such as PGPR-based products,” he stressed.
Dr Dar added that with an increasing pressure on agriculture to produce more food comes intensive cultivation and increased use of agrochemicals. This has resulted in the depletion of non-renewable resources and problems of toxic residues, pesticide resistance and resurgence of secondary pests. “The use of bio-products is rising steadily in all parts of the world. Extensive and systematic research has enhanced the effectiveness of bio-products, and as a result farmers and growers are using them in greater quantities,” he noted. Dr Dar also stressed that bio-products are particularly beneficial to smallholder farmers in the to page 2 ...4