Secondary and Speciality Agriculture to Ensure Health and Nutritional Security

Anand, Gujarat,  2nd June 2012,

Dr. S. Ayyappan, Secretary, DARE and Director General, ICAR urged scientists to work on secondary and speciality agriculture in order to ensure health and nutritional security. He was inaugurating guest house facility at the Directorate of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Research (DMAPR) at Anand. Dr. Ayyappan stressed the need and importance of the research on high value medicinal compounds and functional foods and appreciated the research efforts made by the DMAPR for sustainable production and utilization of major agriculturally important medicinal and aromatic plants in order to meet increasing demand of the herbal industry.

Dr. AM Shekh, Vice Chancellor, Anand Agricultural University (AAU), Anand, in his presidential address, expressed happiness over the instrumentation and infrastructure facility created for the research at the Directorate. Further, he highlighted the problems faced by the medicinal plants growers in Gujarat and other parts of the country.

Prof. Harish Padh, Vice Chancellor, Sardar Patel University, Vallabh Vidya Nagar complimented DMAPR for the work done in the field of medicinal plants for ensuring quality of the raw drug.

Earlier, Dr. Satyabrata Maiti, Director, DMAPR welcomed the Chief Guest and other dignitaries and briefly highlighted the growth and achievements of the Directorate. Dr. J. Jayashanker. Director, Central Institute of Freshwater Aquaculture, Bhubaneswar, Heads and Joint Directors of ICAR  organisations located in Gujarat,  scientists and staff of DMAPR, Anand, the print and visual media participated in the ceremony.  

(Source: NAIP Sub-Project on Mass Media Mobilization, DKMA with inputs from DMAPR, Anand)