Dr. Md. Harunur Rashid
Director, SAC
Director’s Message
SAARC Agriculture Centre (SAC) is the Regional Centre of excellence dedicated to accelerate and promote thematic discussions and capacity building in agriculture and allied sectors for ensuring livelihood, food and nutritional security in South Asia. Realizing the immense contribution of agriculture over the lives and livelihood of the people of South Asia, the Apex Body of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) established the SAC as the first Centre to cater the farming-sector needs of its Member States and currently the Centre has earned the prestige and honour to become the “Centre of Excellence in South Asia.”
The SAC is relentlessly working to document, disseminate and promote farmer-friendly technologies in the broad fields of crops, livestock and fisheries after due contemplation to environment, emerging pest and transboundary diseases, food security and safety, climate change, and finally the consumer health and wellbeing for the regional growth and prosperity. In this direction, the SAC is currently working hard to mitigate conventional and emerging challenges by undertaking programmes, projects and policy guidelines in the much-needed areas; namely “Consortium for Scaling-up Climate Smart Agriculture in South Asia” and “Livelihood Enhancement of the Small Framers in SAARC Region through Small Scale Agro-business Focusing on Value Chain Development.”
The Regional programs and capacity building are prioritized in areas such as family farming, good agricultural practices, transboundary diseases affecting animals, crops and fishes, blue economy, and emerging pest and pathogens. We have dedicated regular programs on “SAARC Food Bank,” “Seeds without Border,” SAARC Agriculture PhD Scholarships etc. It gives me immense pleasure in creating a unified vision related to the opportunities and challenges for the entire South Asia which will fulfill the aspirations of people involved in farming. I hope that the information covered in the current website provides you glimpses of the SAC. I wholeheartedly welcome you to visit the site and open to receive suggestions for further improvement.