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The declaration highlights the need to strengthen digital Infrastructure including digital e-learning content and deployment of emerging immersive technologies across Agricultural Higher Education Institutions

There is a need to strengthen digital Infrastructure including digital e-learning content and deployment of emerging immersive technologies across Agricultural Higher Education Institutions in India. Institutionalising a system-wide Digital Capacity Building Program across stakeholders to improve systemic digital competence, knowledge and skills is also a necessity.

The Delhi Declaration on Modernisation of Agricultural Education System in alignment with the National Education Policy issued jointly by The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and the World Bank highlights the need to incorporate digital resources and tools for effective and accessible teaching and learning in Agriculture. It lays emphasis towards creating a renewed and resilient system for gender-inclusive and sustainable education that will pave the way for India’s agriculture education sector. Multidisciplinary technology-facilitated education should be promoted and the policies on Science, Technology, Engineering, Agriculture and Mathematics (STEAM) in agricultural higher education need to be transformed.

The Delhi Declaration was unveiled on the concluding day of the successful three-day International Conference on Blended Learning Ecosystem for Higher Education in Agriculture 2023 hosted jointly by the ICAR and the World Bank. The Conference was held as part of the National Agricultural Higher Education Project’s (NAHEP) Resilient Agricultural Education System (RAES) development initiative.

Undertaken to strengthen the National Agricultural Education System in the country, NAHEP is a five-year project initiated in 2018 with an equal contribution of $82.5 million (about Rs. 600 crores) each from the World Bank and the central government. The World Bank loan is to be repaid over 19 years after a grace period of five years, the purpose of NAHEP is to transform agricultural higher education. The Blended Learning Platform is part of the project.

Speaking at the valedictory session, Dr R B Singh, Former President of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (NAAS) and Chairman, of the Agricultural Scientists Recruitment Board (ASRB) said, “By promoting sustainable development goals through the dissemination of knowledge and skills, we empower the next generation of agricultural leaders to meet the challenges of tomorrow. Let us continue to collaborate across borders and disciplines, to ensure that agriculture remains a force for positive change in the world.”

According to Dr Trilochan Mohapatra, Former Secretary Department of Agricultural Research and Education (DARE) and Director General, ICAR, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, “Education is the backbone of a thriving agricultural sector. Blended learning offers a powerful tool to bridge the gap between traditional classroom teaching and the demands of a rapidly changing world. I urge all stakeholders to embrace it and integrate it into our education systems. It is important for us to embrace new methods and technologies to strengthen the agriculture education system and develop a skilled workforce that can contribute to the growth of the agriculture sector.” 

“India’s agricultural sector pays a massive significance on the country’s economy. Every year, more than 5000 Indian students receive PhDs, which is more than the rest of the globe. I believe NAHEP is the perfect example of how opportunities can be provided for vocational education as it has given the platform to another initiative called the Resilient Agricultural Education System (RAES). We will continue working with the ICAR and the Government of India to disseminate new technologies so that all states of the country can benefit equally from them,” said Dr Auguste Tano Kouame, Country Director, of the World Bank.

The declaration highlights the need to strengthen

The technology uses organic materials such as wastewater as input and offers a dual benefit of bioelectricity generation and waste management

Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati  has recently developed a bio-electrochemical device, Microbial Fuel Cell (MFC) that can generate green energy by treating wastewater.

The use of organic material such as wastewater in MFC makes it an eco-friendly device that offers a dual benefit of bioelectricity generation and waste management. This research was supported by a grant from the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India.

The research was led by Prof Mihir Kumar Purkait along with his PhD student Mukesh Sharma, Department of Chemical Engineering, IIT Guwahati. They developed a bio-electrochemical device that converts chemical energy contained in organic substrates into electrical energy through microbes.

Commending the work of the research team. Prof T G Sitharam, Director IIT Guwahati, said, “This development has provided an excellent sustainable energy source along with treating several wastewaters. After scaling the process, it can be used as a source of clean energy using municipal wastewater and other such areas economically.”

Explaining the long-term impact of the research Prof Mihir Kumar Purkait, Department of Chemical Engineering, IIT Guwahati, said, “Further implementation of this process may provide an excellent alternative to several costlier renewable energy extraction processes. The conducted study reveals that the prepared CEMs are cheaper and perform better as compared to the several reported membranes, assisting in the separation of charges and potential development.”

The present research of IIT Guwahati is dedicated to synthesising several novel high-performance Cation Exchange Membranes (CEMs) comprising a polymeric blend of several high-end polymers doped with Cellulose Acetate (CA) and other modifiers like Graphene Oxide (GO) to obtain membranes with high Ion Exchange Capacity (IEC) and proton conductivity.

The technology uses organic materials such as

This is a significant achievement for India in decoding the whole genome of the native species of shrimp, one of the world’s most important seafood commodities.

The Scientists of the ICAR-Central Institute of Brackishwater Aquaculture, Chennai have recently sequenced and assembled the whole genome of Indian White Shrimp (Penaeus indicus) on their own. This is a significant achievement for India in decoding the whole genome of the native species of shrimp, one of the world’s most important seafood commodities.

The Indian shrimp industry contributes about 11 per cent share of the global production (759,906 Tonnes valued at $4 Billion in 2020) amongst the shrimp producing countries.

The whole genome sequence of P indicus is a major landmark and this very high-quality genome assembly of P indicus is of 1.93 Gb size with contig N50 of 1.4 Mb having very high number of 346 un-gapped contigs of over 1 Mb length and scaffold N50 of 34.4 Mb. Considering the large genomes of >1.5 Gb length, the assembly presented for P indicus is the only crustacean genome and one among the only nine invertebrate genomes sequenced so far to meet the reference standard of 1 Mb contig N50 and 10 Mb scaffold N50 lengths.

The future genetic improvement programmes with focus on P indicus would benefit aquaculture with increased productivity and sustainability across Asia and the other geographical locations where this shrimp species is predominantly found.

The Scientists’ team involved in shrimp genome assembly included Dr MS Shekhar, Dr Vinaya Kumar Katneni, Dr Ashok Kumar Jangam and Dr KK Vijayan.

The shrimp genome sequencing project was financially supported by the ICAR-Consortium Research Platform on Genomics and coordinated by Dr Joy Krushna Jena, Deputy Director General (Fisheries Science), ICAR.

This is a significant achievement for India