HYDERABAD, Nov 24: The third national conference on “agriculture and animal sciences” at the concluding session on Thursday stressed the need for concerted efforts and joint research to restore organic matter of the soil which is fast disappearing due to land degradation.

It called for increasing food and livestock production and formulating realistic agricultural policies.

The conference was organised by the Sindh Agriculture University in Tandojam.

It was attended by 75 agriculture and animal scientists, scholars and experts from all over Pakistan.

The conference recommended to the government to provide more facilities to farmers for increasing per acre yield of crops and advised the growers to use manure as fertiliser.

It recommended that more water should be released downstream Kotri to protect environment and marine life.

It called upon the scientists to evolve new pesticides to save the crops from pest attack.

It recommended consistent research for the use of bio-mass methods to make barren, water-logged and salinity lands productive.

It stressed the need for optimum use and conservation of scarce water resources.

It urged the government to provide essential agriculture input such as fertilisers and certified seeds to farmers on time.

It resolved to hold an international agriculture conference as soon as possible to find out solutions to agricultural problems.

The former vice-chancellor of the Sindh Agriculture University, Dr Abdul Qadir Ansari, said that the entire world was in the grip of environmental pollution and that developing countries must perform a constructive role in this regard.

He said that food resources were on the decrease and population and pollution were on the increase.

He said that the sweet water resources were also becoming scarce.

He said that these problems could only be resolved by agriculture and animal scientists through constant research.

He said that at present the most important thing was judicious use of water resources and conservation of water.

He warned that if this was not done, the entire population of the world would be in deep trouble.

Sindh Agriculture University vice-chancellor Dr Bashir Shaikh said that poverty and hunger were the two main problems faced by underdeveloped countries.

He said that if food resources were not increased by the 2050 year, the poor people would starve to death.

He said that tens of thousands of people went to bed without food and thousands of children were dying of malnutrition.