UAF plans to branch out into rural areas

University of Agriculture Faisalabad to launch satellite campuses to cater to growing demand for agri-education.

ISLAMABAD: The University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF) has announced that it will establish satellite campuses in regional centres across the country.

A satellite campus or branch campus is a campus of a college or university that is detached from the main campus.

“We saw the need for branches while keeping in view the difficulties and problems faced by small and depressed farming communities, which comprise 86% of the farmers,” said UAF Vice Chancellor Dr Iqrar Ahmed, while to The Express Tribune.

He said though knowledge and technology campuses existed across the country, education regarding the goods and services sector stayed untapped due to lack of communications amongst stakeholders concerned.

Punjab Agricultural University in Ludhiana, India was an example as it was educating local farmers in their mother tongue. The UAF was also trying to copy their model and striving hard to provide innovative solutions and education at the doorsteps of farmers in native language. “This will bring an agriculture revolution in the country.”

Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif will inaugurate the UAF’s sub-campus at Burewala, southern Punjab on February 13. Giving details, Ahmed said the inaugural ceremony will be held at the Regional Agricultural Development Centre.

He also underscored the need to make the inaugural ceremony attractive to the visitors. The academia decided to organise a bulk race, fancy birds show, greyhound and horse dance to attract the rural population.

The deans committee also decided to hold a tent-pegging competition from February 6 to 12, where 100 teams, international and domestic, will participate. Three international teams from the United Kingdom, South Africa and India have confirmed their participation.

The committee also approved the establishment of a Nuerocognitive Behavioural Sciences Research Centre at the premises. The centre will help psychological screening of the faculty and students of the institution and assessment of their training needs.

Under the existing stringent socioeconomic environment of the country, the centre will enable the lowest strata of the population to have affordable access to latest tools and techniques taking human resource into the right channels of society.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 6^th, 2013.

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