ISLAMABAD: With the aim to sensitise students for working for healthy environment through promotion of urban agriculture, the Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC) and Overseas Pakistanis Foundation (OPF) have launched an olive plantation campaign at the OPF Girls College Islamabad.
The olive plantation drive was formally launched by PARC Chairman Dr Iftikhar Ahmad and OPF Managing Director Habib-ur-Rehman Khan by planting an olive sapling in the school campus.
Among others, OPF Girls College Principal Shaheena Masood, PARC Member Coordination and Monitoring and National Project Director Olive Dr M Munir Goraya, PARC Director Public Relations Sardar Ghulam Mustafa, Director Mechanism Dr Ghazanfer Abbas, Officer Olive Project, Attique Ahmed and senior officers from PARC, teachers and staff of OPF College were present on the occasion.
The PARC management initially provided as many as one hundred imported olive saplings to the school management to be planted in the school premises while one hundred more plants would be provided soon.
Both the institutions agreed that initially the plantation drive would be carried out in the Girls College F-8 Campus which would be extended later to the other campuses of the OPF college system.
Speaking on the occasion, Dr Iftikhar Ahmad urged academia and students to help PARC in materialising the concept of urban agriculture, initially in the capital city Islamabad.
“Pakistan’s progress and prosperity is linked with agriculture, so as much as we promote this sector it would help boost overall economy of the country,” he said. Besides promoting the rural agriculture, there is need that we also work for urban agriculture to help cities produce vegetable and fruits to cater to their own consumption demands.
