August 22, 2006	Tuesday	Rajab 26, 1427

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RAWALPINDI, Aug 21: Federal Minister and Chairman Higher Education Commission (HEC) Dr. Atta-ur-Rehman on Monday asked the Pakistan Society of Sugar Technologists to prepare PC1 for a high quality sugar technology research and training institute for the development of sugar industry.

Speaking as chief guest at 41st convention of PSST he said that sugar research institute was need of the hour to gain maximum economic benefits from the sugar industry.

The HEC chairman announced Rs30 million for initiating the project. He assured the PSST that PC-1 would be approved within 60 days by the Science and Technology ministry.

He said another possibility of establishing the institute was public-private partnership and added that such institute would be established on the pattern of Punjwani centre for Molecular and Drug Development.

Dr Atta said that HEC would encourage collaboration between private and public sector in establishing research and training facilities.

Highlighting the importance of sugarcane, he said that the country could benefit a lot by producing by-products of sugarcane and exporting them in international market, adding that utilisation of molasses for producing ethanol, citric acid and oxalic acid could earn a huge amount of foreign exchange.

He said that the HEC had been working to establish new engineering universities with the help of foreign countries to produce quality output and added a university of this sort would start functioning with the help of France by the end of October 2007.

Other such universities would start working by the end of October 2008, he said adding that industrial bio-technology department would be established in all universities of Pakistan.

He said that the HEC had an objective to promote high quality research-based education and added 500 students were being sent abroad for higher education yearly and the number would touch now 2000.

He said that the number of Pakistani students studying abroad was increasing each day and added Pakistanis were second in number after China studying in Sweden. He said Pakistani students had now access to 20,000 international journals and 4,000 textbooks. The HEC Chairman said “if we have to make the future of our country brighter, we will have to focus on 54 per cent population of Pakistan which comprises youth below 20”.

Speaking on the occasion, president PSST Abdul Waheed Qureshi stressed the need for establishing Sugar Technology Research and Training Institute and said Pakistan was the fifth largest sugar producing country of the world but it lacks such an institute.

He said that PSST has contributed substantially in the field of research and development without any noticeable assistance from any concerned quarter.