Pakistan Engineering Council Engineer Chairman Jawed Salim Qureshi on Wednesday said agriculture is the backbone of our economy that is directly linked to poverty alleviation.

Therefore, collaborated efforts are needed for the handholding of farming community, downtrodden segment of the society, and to promote modern and smart technology in the fields for increasing per acre productivity. He addressed annual convention of Pakistan Society of Agricultural Engineer arranged by Faculty of Agriculture Engineering UAF at Center of Advanced Studies Auditorium UAF . He stressed upon the need to develop entrepreneurship among the engineers keeping in view market and unemployment issues. He added that PEC will start the Engineering Construction Bank to provide interest free loan to young engineers for their start–up companies and to address the issues of modern era. He said that PEC was equipped enough to shoulder the responsibility of developing dams if given the opportunity. He said that the country was having the capacity of the low priced electricity but unfortunately we were not tapping the fruits of the potential. He said that the high cost of the electricity was hampering the exports. He viewed that in the engineering related departments of the government, there must be engineers at the top slots for better results. UAF Vice Chancellor Dr Muhammad Ashraf said that we have to narrow down the gap of industry academic linkages. He said that engineers should come up with low-priced agro technology for the small holding farms so that the per acre productions can be increased manifold. He said that the value addition in the agriculture and food sector was the need of the hour to compete with the rest of the world. He said that in China, Agriculture Department regulates agro zoning and implementation of agricultural reforms. He said that such model was the prerequisite to fight the challenges of the modern era. He said that we had developed the seed act in the county but still we are facing numerous problems in its implementations. Dean Faculty of Agriculture Engineering Dr Allah Buksh said that all out efforts were being made to produce the trained engineers . FDA DG Amir Aziz also attended.