LAHORE: Governor Chaudhry Sarwar says the globalisation has transformed the economic and social conditions in terms of increased globalised trade, integration of global financial markets, enhanced mobility of capital, and a competitive environment. He says the professional education is at the hub of the globalisation activities.

The governor said this at the sixth convocation of the University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (UVAS) on Thursday.

At the convocation, the governor and UVAS Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Talat Naseer Pasha conferred degrees upon 26 PhD scholars and medals to 39 position-winning graduates. Overall, 826 graduates received their degrees that included 197 DVM, 180 BS (Honours), 70 Pharm-D, 25 MBA, 22 MBF, one MSc Wetland and 305 MPhil.

Mr Sarwar said livestock held immense importance for a country like Pakistan as it was contributing substantially to the GDP and economic development. Besides provision of healthy food, he said, it was a source of rural employment, income generation and raw material for local industries. He said the livestock was also earning foreign exchange. “Boosting livestock growth and productivity is, therefore, essential to meet the food requirements for our increasing population and to alleviate poverty,” he said.

In order to improve educational standards, the governor said, there was a need to implement effective monitoring and evaluation system in line with the best global practices. He suggested the setting up of incubation centres in universities to promote and patronise research, innovation and business ventures.

He said the universities should accept new challenges to keep Pakistan moving forward.

The governor said the UVAS had worked to improve standards of education and research and maintaining community interaction.

Prof Pasha said the varsity had developed state-of-the-art-clinics, teaching, training, research and diagnostic facilities for its over 4,900 students on rolls from across Pakistan including reserved seats for Fata, Balochistan, Afghanistan, held Kashmir and Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

He said the university had achieved 93.3 per cent score in HEC assessment. In the HEC ranking, he said, the university had also achieved highest ‘W’ category and secured third position in HEC ranking of agricultural/veterinary universities of Pakistan.

At present, the VC said, the university was currently undertaking 57 research projects worth Rs664.725 million won by faculty members through competition.

“This year there is 146 percent increase in securing research grants as compared with 2013,” he said, adding 82 more research projects submitted by faculty to different national and international funding agencies were under review.

He said the faculty members and students had published over 408 research papers in HEC recognized impact factor journals.

Prof Pasha said the university was also closely working with the Punjab Livestock and Dairy Development Department for serving the farming and business communities for provision of healthy food of high biological value from livestock and poultry to the people of Pakistan.

He said the university had also taken an initiative for progressive control of foot and mouth disease. “We will be providing our research based Foot and Mouth and Hemorrhagic Septicemia Vaccine to the department initially for the next six years,” he said.

He said the university was also establishing an institution at Bahawalpur to cater to the needs of south Punjab in education, research, disease diagnostics, training and keeping pace with innovations in the livestock, poultry, wildlife and allied sectors and needs of industry and trade. “A project for Cholistan University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences at Bahawalpur has been approved by the Punjab government. The work on this project is going on at full pace with the collaboration of Ankara University and Selcuk University, Turkey. This will be a two years project and will be completed by June 2016,” he added.

The UVAS also signed a memorandum of understanding with the Pakistan Tanners Association in the presence of the governor.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2014