Karnal: Lecture dwells on education’s role in agricultural growth

Karnal, March 11

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR)-National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI), Karnal, today organised a lecture on ‘Transforming Agricultural Education to Feed the Future: Entrepreneurship and Innovation’.

Dr Rakesh Chandra Agrawal, Deputy Director General (Agricultural Education), ICAR, New Delhi, delivered the lecture and highlighted the pivotal role of agricultural education in India’s economic growth.

He emphasised the remarkable transformation witnessed in India’s agricultural education sector, citing the establishment of state agricultural universities, deemed universities, Central agricultural universities and central universities with agricultural faculties.

Dr Agrawal was honoured with the Dr. NN Dastur Memorial Oration Award-2024 for contribution to agricultural education.

Dr Dheer Singh, Director and Vice-Chancellor of ICAR–NDRI Deemed University, while presiding over the event, said Dr Agrawal has done a commendable work in the biodiversity informatics, information management, intellectual property rights, farmers’ rights and agricultural education.

Dr Agrawal underscored the importance of the National Education Policy (NEP)-2020 in shaping agricultural education, focusing on nurturing individual’s creative potential and fostering cognitive, social, ethical, and emotional growth.

He also outlined strategic initiatives to implement the NEP-2020 in the agricultural education landscape, including increasing seats in agricultural universities, promoting multidisciplinary institutions, and enhancing gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher agricultural education.

He added that the National Agricultural Higher Education Project of ICAR was initiated in 2017-18 and it aimed to develop resources and mechanisms for supporting infrastructure, faculty and student advancement. Highlighting ICAR’s efforts, Dr Agrawal mentioned the all-India entrance examination for admission to MSc and all-India competitive examination for admission to PhD programmes as integral components in advancing agricultural education.