February 03, 2009	Tuesday	Safar 07, 1430

RAWALPINDI, Feb 2: A seven-day training course on tunnel farming started here at Arid Agriculture University AAU on Monday. The training course is organized by the Department of Horticulture in collaboration with Agribusiness Support Fund (ASF).

The purpose of the course is to disseminate the know-how among the progressive farmers about growing off-season vegetables under protected environment such as poly tunnel farming. The participants will be given theoretical and practical training by faculty members of horticulture department and the resource person from different departments on different aspects of poly tunnel farming followed by field visits.

At the inaugural session of the training course Prof Dr Khalid Mahmood Khan, Vice Chancellor of the university was the chief guest. While speaking to the participants the VC said growing off-season vegetables was a growing phenomenon in Pakistan and there was a demand for technical know-how about the field helping people enter this business.

According to après release the VC further said that tunnel production was a modern technique of growing vegetables, flowers and fruits in plastic tunnels. Many advance countries like America, Canada, China and a number of European countries benefited from this technique but Pakistan is far behind in adoption of this technology.

Tunnel farming can be used to produce any range of agricultural product, without the limitations of seasons or the weather. Tunnel farming is also far more labour-intensive and has a far more consistent yield. He expressed the hope that this training course, by sharing the knowledge and experiences, would be a source of improvement in the area of tunnel farming.

Muzaffar Ali Bhutta, a representative of ASF in his address said that his fund was a not-for-profit group, established by the Ministry of Food Agriculture & Livestock (MINFAL) and supported by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) under the Agribusiness Development and Diversification Project (ADDP). ASF extends its support in the shape of matching grants (free money) to agribusiness concerns in the horticulture and livestock sectors, he added.

He further said that ASF provided financial support to individuals as well as enterprises either engaged in consultancy, advisory businesses or running their existing agribusinesses, by sharing up to 50 per cent of the cost of participation in training programmes held within and outside Pakistan.

Prof Dr Nadeem Akhtar Abbasi, Chairman Horticulture Department in his address welcomed the participants and briefed them about the aims and importance of the tunnel farming.

This training will be helpful for the farmers in growing off-season vegetables through ‘tunnel technology’, growing seasonal open field vegetables, conducting agri-echo system analysis for identification of insect, pests, diseases, nutritional deficiencies, soil problems, integrated crop management techniques, capacity building of farmers for making their own decisions according to situation for better crop management, he said.