Intercropping growing two or more crops on the same piece of land. This method is widely practised around the world to save both time and money.
Unfortunately for years In Pakistan, no proper work has been done on this to make the country economically strong by producing more output with fewer inputs used.
Recently a big development is made by Islamia University Bahawalpur by establishing the National Research Centre of Intercropping (NRCI) in Bahawalpur. This is the first research centre established to properly work on intercropping. A formal notification was also issued by the University. This Research centre will help promote intercropping to effectively use inputs for more than one crop.
This centre is firstly affiliated with the Ministry of Agriculture in China. The Sichuan Agriculture University is well known in this regard their scientist will collaborate with Pakistani researchers to promote intercropping in Pakistan.
Vice-Chancellor of the Islamia University of Bahawalpur Professor Athar Mehboob (IUB) said they are looking to transfer Chinese intercropping technology especially maize-soybean, cotton-soybean and cotton-peanut from China to Pakistan. He said they will also invite Chinese intercropping researchers to Pakistan for better technology transfer.
The centre has been given 25 acres of land, according to reports. “Intercropping technology is well-known among Chinese scientists. We will provide land for Chinese professors and scientists to conduct research and technology transfer, especially those working on intercropping technologies.
Muhammad Ali Raza, a post-doc from Sichuan Agriculture University said Pakistan wants to increase soybean production desperately so that oil import can be minimized in Pakistan. He is already conducting experiments on maize-soybean intercropping in Pakistan at different locations.
Source: China Economic Net (CEN)
