President ECOSF meets the Deputy Minister of Agriculture-Jehad of Iran

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President ECOSF Prof. Manzoor H. Soomro while in Tehran for participation in the Mustafa^(pbuh) Prize award ceremony, was invited to visit the Ministry of Agriculture-Jehad in Tehran-Iran on 20 October 2021. The President was warmly welcomed in the Ministry by the Deputy Minister for Horticultural Affairs Dr. Mohammad Mehdi Boroumandi flanked by General Directors of various departments of the Iranian Ministry. The Ministry of Agriculture had invited Prof. Soomro- a professional agricultural expert in his own right and as the President of ECO Science Foundation (ECOSF), to discuss and explore the possibilities of cooperation with other ECO member countries through ECOSF, leading to enhancing the trade in agricultural commodities.

The Deputy Minister introduced his team and briefed the President ECOSF on the plans and initiatives of the Iranian Ministry and indicated intension to operate. He mainly shared the strengths of Iranian Agriculture sector and willingness to cooperate in R&D as well as trade between Iran and other ECO member countries.

President ECOSF briefed the Iranian Deputy Minister and his team on what ECOSF is and what activities it is pursuing, thereby highlighting various on-going initiatives of the Foundation. He particularly emphasized on the ECOSF’s international cooperation especially developed with Chinese institutions such as; China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) including the Teenager Maker Camps and School Teachers workshops as well as the capacity building in science, engineering, technology and innovation (SETI) for economic development with the Beijing Technology and Business University (BTBU), Beijing under the Belt and Road Initiative of China. Prof. Soomro also shared with Dr. Boroumandi the ECOSF initiative on inquiry based science education (IBSE) for teachers’ capacity building by emphasizing on the need for building the capacity of food producers- the farmers using inquiry based learning novel approach of farmer field schools (FFS). Dr. Soomro also shared with the hosts about his talk and interaction previous day (19 Oct) with the faculty of the College of Agriculture at the Isfahan University of Technology (IUT), Isfahan Iran. He then offered ECOSF assistance in building the capacity of Iranian agriculture extension experts and growers through FFS, and suggested to the Iranian Ministry of Agriculture-Jehad to share some proposals with ECOSF as to what aspects exactly they wish to take up for ECOSF support.

The Deputy Minister of Iran was very appreciative of the activities of ECOSF and assured to share the ideas for cooperation between them and ECOSF.