HYDERABAD, Jan 22: The three-day second international symposium on biotechnology at its concluding session at the Sindh University has recommended the establishment of a science city in Jamshoro as four public and private universities are located there.

The symposium was jointly organized by the Institute of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering, University of Sindh, and the Nuclear Institute of Agriculture, Tandojam.

It recommended that all the universities of the country should be given due representation on the National Commission on Biotechnology. The symposium recommended that while disbursing the research grants, importance should be given to biotechnology and its share should be placed under a separate head and the allocated grant should be equally distributed among different institutions engaged in research activities in the all too important field of biotechnology.

It is pointed out as biotechnology is a promising research field that can be helpful in solving problems of poverty and unemployment through enhanced production in agriculture and industry, it should be patronized and the amount of research grant should be enhanced.

It recommended the discipline of biotechnology should be introduced in all the educational institutions at undergraduate level and a close dynamic relationship should be ensured between biotechnology and biological sciences such as chemistry, biology, biochemistry, microbiology and molecular biology.

The symposium was of the opinion that this relationship would provide strong research for all biological sciences and technology. The government was requested to provide adequate funds for planning and implementation of the project.

In the technical sessions of the symposium, scholars presented more then 50 research papers on different topics of biotechnology. The scholars maintained that biotechnology was an aggregationof science and technologies that utilizes living organism to develop food, medicines, and other products of daily use.

They said the subject of biotechnology was relatively a young scientific discipline as compared to physical and biological sciences specially in the developing countries.

The scholars said this field had the potential to bring about revolutionary changes in agricultural production, development of livestock, increasing industrial production, improvement in human nutritional standard and alleviation of disease.

Those who read papers included Nuzhat Ahmed, the center for molecular genetic engineering University of Karachi, M. Zamani, M. Motallebi, the Razi University of Iran and Dr. M. Y. Khuhawar, University of Sindh.