P.A.U,APICULTURE MUST BE GIVEN DUE RECOGNITION: DR KANG

LUDHIANA, FEBRUARY 24:



A three-day honey festival-cum-experience exchange workshop on prospects and promotion of apiculture for augmenting hive and crop productivity,' organized by PAU Department of Entomology in association with Directorate of Extension Education, culminated here today.



Chairing the plenary session, Dr Manjit Singh Kang, Vice-Chancellor, PAU, said that the university has been a leader in meeting the agricultural challenges including the apiculture. The subsequent basic and need-based applied apicultural research and dissemination of technologies designed by PAU has brought a sea-change in the development of beekeeping in India. Dr Kang added that this has been important from the standpoints of agricultural diversification, development of agro-based entrepreneurship, and subsequent rapid commercialization and industrialization of apiculture. He revealed that at present, Punjab has about 25,000 beekeepers, who annually produce more than 10,000 metric tones of honey. This production represents about 30 per cent of the country's total apiary honey production, said he, adding that the state is the leader in the manufacture and production of quality beekeeping equipment including honey processing plants, as well as in trained manpower to manage honey bees. Due recognition must be given to apiculture to realize higher hive and crop productivity, enhanced profitability and social and economic upliftment of rural population, stressed Dr Kang. As the honey bees are directly affected by injudicious use of pesticides, climate change and large scale conversion of barren lands into monocultures, he emphasized on the need for scientific management to cope with these emerging problems.



Addressing the gathering, Dr M.S. Gill, Director of Extension Education, PAU, stated that beekeeping is an enterprise and has become an important agricultural allied industry in the state for supplementing farmers' income. Referring to the extension activities, Dr Gill added that besides basic beekeeping training courses for beginners, the department has been organizing advanced and specialized hands-on trainings on mass queen bee rearing, production of bee products other than honey and diversification of beekeeping for progressive beekeepers, development functionaries and scientists from ICAR institutes.



Three technical sessions on 'technological innovations and interventions of scientific principles in beekeeping for higher profitability' and 'apicultural diversification for augmenting hive productivity' took place today. The sessions, chaired by Dr LR Verma, Dr Kuldeep Singh and Dr SK Sharma, saw deliberations on honey bees' pests and diseases, policy initiatives required for beekeeping in India, advance and innovative technologies in apicultural research, prospects of honey bee attractants in enhancing crop productivity in India and genomics based improvement of honey bees. The apiculturists and eminent scientists also dwelt on bee products, processing and marketing of honey, operational strategies for maximizing bee hive productivity in India with thrust on present status and future strategies. Dr Kang gave away the prizes for the best poster presentation.



Dr. A.K.Dhawan, provided an overview of the conference proceedings which was followed by report presentations by rapporteaurs of different technical sessions. The recommendations emerging from the event included recognition to apiculture as a scientific discipline, re-orienting research to enhance farmers profitability, stressing non-chemical treatments in bee-keeping, popularizing bee-keeping through academic endeavours and trainings as a means to enhance productivity of crops.



Dr Gursharan Singh, Dean, Post Graduate Studies, proposing the vote of thanks, said that the workshop would serve as a new step to examine the various issues relative to augmentation of hive and crop productivity. Speaking on behalf of the audience, Dr. N.P.Goyal, President of Indian Bee-keepers Association appreciated PAU for its pro-farming programmes and congratulated Dr. Kang for PAU\'s fetching a national award of being the Best Agricultural University of India. A standing ovation was given by the audience.



The deans, directors, additional directors, coordinators of research, heads and faculty members of various departments of PAU participated in this occasion.
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