TOBA TEK SINGH: Renowned wheat genetics and genomics scientist and founding director of the Wheat Genetics Resources Center at US Kansas State University (KSU) Prof Dr Bikram S Gill has urged young breeders to work on introducing high-yielding, climate and insect resilient crops using emerging technologies to ensure food security and feed the ever-increasing world population.

He addressed a public lecture on emerging technologies for crop improvement in Pakistan at University of Agriculture of Faisalabad (UAF) on Sunday.

For nearly 50 years, Gill’s research has focused on conserving wild and ancient grains and utilizing them in the breeding of modern wheat varieties, particularly bread wheat that is more nutritious, disease-resistant, and high-yielding.

He said that his centre has a large range of the genotype of wheat available for international scientists. He said that the center’s gene bank, which maintains more than 5,000 wheat genetic stocks, and its laboratory offer opportunities for graduate students and postdoctoral researchers to work with industry partners and academic scientists to develop new genetic research that quickly improves crop yield, quality, and food security.

He added that Punjab’s land is the best-fertilized land due to the rivers, climate, and four seasons. He added that with the passage of time, we are devastating our ecosystem by polluting the soil, air, and water.

He said they had earned competitive research grants worth $30 million for plant breeding at KSU under which tangible agricultural development was witnessed.

Regarding the gluten in wheat’s effect on health, he said that one small portion of the gluten in wheat is not good and can be eliminated by using crisper technology in genome editing. UAF Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan said that Dr Gill is the great leader of wheat whose work made it possible to address the wheat challenges.

He urged the researchers to come up with valuable ideas to earn research projects to serve the agricultural sector. He said that the famine of the 60s was addressed by Norman Borlaug, a Nobel Laureate, who led the Green Revolution while working on semi-dwarf, high-yield, disease-resistant wheat varieties.

He said that the wheat strain developed by Norman Borlaug helped Pakistan double its wheat yield between 1965 and 1970. He said that UAF was developing wheat varieties in collaboration with Washington State University.

OFFLOADED: The Faisalabad Federal Investigation Agency’s (FIA) immigration team offloaded four passengers at Faisalabad airport on Sunday from a flight bound for Saudi Arabia.

An FIA spokesperson said that Azhar Ali, Abdul Qadeer, Oan Sahil, and Sumair Ali had visas for Saudi Arabia, where they were going to perform Umra, but they had to proceed to Libya on fake documents, which had been recovered from their custody.

They were handed over to the anti-human trafficking cell for further investigation, and raids were also being conducted to arrest the agent who prepared their fake documents.

Published in Dawn, February 19th, 2024