The University of Agriculture Faisalabad Academic Council has approved two research and development cells including Locust Research Cell; and Organic Agriculture Cell that will help the country to address the agricultural challenges. The meeting was presided over by UAF Vice Chancellor Dr Muhammad Ashraf.

The locust cell is working under the auspices of the Department of Entomology and Organic Agriculture Cell will be established at the Department of Agronomy. The meeting also approved BS Computer Sciences and BS Mathematics at sub-campus Okara- Depalpur and BS Animal Sciences at Toba Tek Singh campus. Dr Muhammad Ashraf said that amid the current situation of COVID 19, online classes are in full swings, enabling students to carry on their academic work as an initiative to encourage social distancing. Tens of the thousands of students have registered in the online class system. He said that different leaning management system, YouTube, LMS, and Zoom etc are being used by the faculty and students. He said that locust had become second corona virus for the food security. He stressed upon the need to work on war footing to fight the crisis to ensure the food security. He said after the 27 years, it had hit crops at the huge level. He said that to search food, locusts travel in swarms in millions. He said that they had kicked off a research work on locust life history, attacked areas, various stages with day, critical stage to hit for low pesticide, management techniques, potential threats, effect of climate changes, and mitigation strategies. He also directed the Director Research to come up with the proposal of establishment of nano fertilizer cell. Registrar Umar Saeed Qadri said that under the ICT project, Enterprise Resource Planning and Campus Management System being introduced as a step on campus on SAP cloud. He said that all possible measures were being taken to address the problems of the campus community. The meeting also parlayed for the departed soul of former Chairman Mathematic Shiekh Muhammad Ashfaq. The meeting also prayed for the departed soul of the mother of Deputy Treasurer Rana Khalid.