First International Agrobiodiversity Congress starts on Sunday

New Delhi: The First International Agrobiodiversity Congress – IAC 2016 starts on Sunday gather with the participating  900 delegations from 60 countries here at Vigyan Bhawan. The congress will be inaugurated by the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.

This international congress will initiate and encourage a dialogue among relevant stake-holders including farmers to better understand everyone’s role in agro-biodiversity management and the conversation of genetic resources.

Agriculture biodiversity is the foundation of sustainable agricultural development and is an essential natural resource to ensure current and future food nutrition security. As the world faces challenges, such as global malnutrition, climate change, increasing agicultural productivity, reducing risk and increasing shrinking food security. We need everyone’s attention and concern for the conservation and use of these precious resources because they provide essential raw materials for our agriculture systems and peoples’ livelihoods.

“India is the perfect venue for the first ever International Agrobiodiversity Congress as it is one of the most diverse countries in the world. It takes up only 2.4% of the world’s land area, and yet it harbours 7-8% of all recorded species, including over 45,000 species of plants and 91,000 species of animals (CBD, 2014).

The congress will provoke discussion and knowledge sharing on issues for the effective and efficient management of genebanks, science-led innovations in the field of genetic resources, livelihood, food and nutrition security through crop diversification, including use of lesser known crops and the role of crops wild relatives in crop improvement, issues relating to quarantine, biosafety and biosecurity, and intellectual property rights and access and benefit sharing in the context of exchange of germplasm.

To deliberate on the role of all the stakeholders in effective management and use of agrobiodiversity, a public forum has also been planned during the congress.