SOA Lecture: Agri Scientist Warns Against Over-Exploitation Of Natural Resources

Bhubaneswar: An eminent agricultural scientist has called for alternate production systems to ensure there was no over-exploitation of the country’s natural resources.

“At present, we are exploiting our natural resources to such an extent that it is beyond repair because we have to feed a population of over 140 crore people,” Dr Puronjan Das, former Deputy Director General of Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR), said on Wednesday.

“To ensure that there is no further damage to our natural resources, we need to identify alternate production systems,” he stated while delivering the seventh Dr M S Swaminathan Memorial Lecture at Institute of Agricultural Sciences (IAS), SOA’s faculty of agricultural sciences.

The alternate production systems should be water smart in terms of per kilogram of production, energy smart in terms of higher energy output per kilogram of energy input, low Green House Gas (GHG) emission by identifying the conventional inputs used in agriculture and by substituting them with alternate inputs which would ensure low GHG emission, he suggested.

The objective should be to ensure lower carbon sustainable index in view of the fact that the atmosphere is already heavy with increasing level of carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide, Dr Das opined.

SOA Vice-Chancellor Prof. Pradipta Kumar Nanda and Dean (Students’ Welfare) Prof. Jyoti Ranjan Das attended the lecture.