Bioversity International officials visit Karimnagar

Karimnagar: The officials of Bioversity International along with the scientists of ICAR and PJTSAU who were working for the qualification of ecosystem services in Godavari Basin, visited Karimnagar on Thursday.

Speaking on the occasion, the regional representatives of Bioversity International South Asia, Dr N K Krishna Kumar explained the purpose of their visit to the stakeholders including seed, pesticide and fertilizer dealers and interacted with the farming community.

He said that the previous century was the century of green revolution and witnessed a quantum leap in production from 51 million tonnes to 200 million tonnes with the use of fertilizers and pesticides. But in spite of self sufficiency, we lost the fertility of soil due to excess usage of carbon content fertilizers along with depletion of water table.

Due to pollution of water and air, the pollutants entered into the crops and fish that are grown resulting in genetic diversity to a great extent. So, one of the goals of the United Nations is the sustainable development.

To achieve it, the people must address the issues of soil, water and air pollution and must work for the development of biodiversity along with implementing perfect agricultural practices, he added.

He informed that the Bioversity international is working with the collaboration of ICAR and PJTSAU along with NBFGR(Lucknow) universities to achieve sustainable development in India.

They are working on Godavari Basin in Karimnagar district and are meeting with the stakeholders to know about their perception on biodiversity and ecosystem services.

Dr Rehman, Dr Vasudev principal scientists of PJTSAU, foreign delegates Sarah, Natalia, Fransisca associate scientists of Bioversity International Rome, K Shekar scientists (Agronam) V Sridhar district agriculture officer, Karimnagar were present.