HONOUR: Udai Shankar Awasthi, Abdul Rauf A. Shaik and Mallanna Shankranna Nagaral with the citations after they were conferred honorary doctorates at the 20th convocation of the University of Agricultural Sciences in Dharwad on Tuesday.

HUBLI: The University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS), Dharwad, plans to produce sufficient woolly aphid-resistant sugarcane seedlings raised through tissue culture technology to cover about one lakh hectares of land by 2007.

Presenting a report on the activities of the university at its 20th chere on Tuesday, S.A. Patil, Vice-Chancellor, said the UAS was the first to develop the woolly aphid-resistant variety in 2003.

The university has also identified sugarcane woolly aphid resistant clones and they were being multiplied through single eye bud and tissue culture techniques. Four lakh seedlings have been distributed to farmers through sugar factories, he said.

Dr. Patil said the UAS had standardised mass multiplication techniques for two predators — Micromus igorotus and Dipha aphidivora — and set up three production units in collaboration with sugar factories, apart from the two in the university.

In order to promote organic farming, the UAS had initiated systematic measures for transforming 20 agricultural research stations of the university as centres of technology generation and knowledge dissemination through verification-cum-demonstrations during 2005-06. This was in addition to similar steps taken at 12 such centres during 2004-05, he said.

Dr. Patil said the Bt Cotton variety NHH-44 developed by the university would be ready for commercial release by 2008. He said the scientists at the university had made a breakthrough in the transfer of gene for blue colour from petunia (flowering plant) to cotton to add blue colour to the existing brown and green shades.

He said the Bt gene has been transferred to local brinjal cultivators under the collaboration programme involving Cornell University, U.S., Mahyco- Monsanto and the UAS. Development of Bt Brinjal would keep pesticides off and thus provide relief to the grower and the consumer from insecticides, he said.

Dr. Patil said the university had entered into collaboration with international institutes such as McGill University (Canada), Texas A&M University (U.S.), Cornell University (U.S.) for human resource development, postgraduate programmes and collaborative and contract research programmes.

Governor T.N. Chaturvedi conferred various degrees on 547 candidates, including 28 doctoral degrees, 171 postgraduate degrees and 348 bachelor's degrees. The Governor also conferred Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) on Udai Shankar Awasthi, Abdul Rauf A. Shaik and Mallanna Shankranna Nagaral.

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