US to help Pakistan modernise agriculture

ISLAMABAD: In the third meeting of the Pak-US strategic dialogue on agriculture held on Tuesday, it was agreed that collaborative research would be strengthened and private sector support for economic growth in the agriculture sector would be broadened.

Secretary Ministry of Food and Agriculture Junaid Iqbal led the Pakistani side, assisted by the Chief Coordinator of the Strategic Dialogue Secretariat, Malik Zahoor Ahmad.

The US delegation was co-chaired by Deputy Under-Secretary for Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services Darci Vetter, US Department of Agriculture and Assistant Administrator USAID James Bever.

It was agreed that both sides would continue to work to modernise Pakistan’s agricultural sector to ensure adequate supply of food items, foster economic growth, alleviate poverty and enhance rural employment. Areas identified for future cooperation include crop productivity enhancement, particularly wheat and cotton, animal and plant diseases, dairy development, horticulture, market access for Pakistani products, including mangoes, and capacity building in SPS issues as well as various other areas of research development and water management. The last meeting of the agriculture track was held in Washington in March this year, after agriculture was added as a separate track in the second round of Strategic Dialogue in 2007.

The countries are cooperating in a total of 10 fields. On Wednesday, talks will be held on the expansion of cooperation in the energy sector, reported Online news agency.  The US has said that it would provide assistance to Pakistan to overcome the energy crisis.

Published in the Express Tribune, June 16^th, 2010.