The quality assurance agency (QAA)of Higher Education Commission (HEC) has approved 54 degrees under postgraduate programmes offered at Pir Mehr Ali Shah Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi.
The decision was taken after an HEC committee, extensively reviewed postgraduate programmes offered by Arid university, during which the university also submitted a series of compliance reports.
The committeereviewed bles of students and faculty along with allied documents and files from the MS, MSc, MPhil, MSc (Hons) and PhD programmes.
The approved degrees fall under the programmes offered in agri economics (MSc-Hons and PhD), agriengineering (MSc-Hons and PhD), agri-extension (MSc-Hons), agronomy (MSc-Hons and PhD), animal breeding and genetics (MPhil, PhD), animal nutrition (MPhil), biochemistry (MPhil), biotechnology (MPhil), biology (MPhil), botany (MPhil, PhD), computer sciences (MS , PhD), economics (MPhil, PhD), education (MPhil, PhD), entomology (MSc-Hons, PhD), environmental sciences (MPhil, PhD), food technology (MSc-Hons , PhD), forestry (MPhil , PhD), horticulture (MSc-Hons, PhD), management sciences (MBA, MS, PhD), plant breeding and genetics (MSc-Hons, PhD), plant pathology (MSc-Hons, PhD), remote sensing and GIS (MS, PhD), sociology (MPhil), soil sciences (MS, PhD), statistics (MPhil), veterinary medicine and surgery (MPhil, PhD), veterinary microbiology (MPhil and PhD), veterinary pathology (MPhil, PhD), wildlife (MPhil, PhD) and zoology (MPhil, PhD).
Vice chancellor of the university Prof Dr Qamar Zaman said the university is working hard towards conducting quality research and being head of the institute, it is his prime responsibility to provide an environment where quality education can prosper.
Being agricultural scientists, he said, it is our prime responsibility to conduct quality research because the whole nation depends upon us and if we want Pakistan to progress in the field agriculture, we have to change the behavior of our students towards research drastically.
He said the university has been awarded four projects including National Centre of Industrial Biotechnology, Centre for Agriculture Strategy Development, a pilot project for Data Driven Smart Decision Platform for Increased Agriculture Productivity and National Centre for Livestock Breeding, Genetics and Genomics, which will be established at its campus.
These projects will revolutionise the agricultural sector and ultimately contribute towards national development, he said, adding they will also play an important role in development of systems that are economically viable, environmentally sound and easily adopted by the farming community along with manuf acturers.
