At a two-day international conference on ‘Sustainable food grain production -- challenges and opportunities’ at the University of Agriculture Faisalabad on Wednesday, Mr Baloch said the unavailability of good quality seed, declining soil fertility, fragile cropping systems, looming water crisis, environmental degradation owing to indiscriminate pesticide usage, significant post-harvest food crop losses, minimal value addition and product differentiation, inadequate food storage and preservation and poor marketing system were the major challenges to sustainable food grain production in Pakistan.

To tackle such issues, he said, the government was trying to boost the productivity in the crop sector and four new state-of-the-art research institutions were being set up.

“Agronomists from all around the globe can resolve the upcoming challenges of the agriculture sector facing reducing water and soil resources,” he added.

He urged scientists to reframe their research priorities in accordance with the prerequisites of agri ecological zones as productivity gap between progressive and small farmer should be minimised.

Conference organiser Dr Zahid Ata said the event provided scientists a forum analysing the food security. He said that in spite of emerging security situation in the country a large number of overseas scientists participated in the conference.