The Centre on Wednesday asked the farming community to protect and conserve plant varieties to achieve higher and quality production in the agriculture sector.
Conferring the Plant Genome Saviour Community Award 2011-12 here today, Minister of State for Agriculture and Food Processing Industries, Tariq Anwar called for improvement and preservation of genetic resources of economic plants and their wild relatives particularly in the areas identified as agro-biodiversity hotspots.
Anwar earlier conferred the award on four farmers' groups from Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Tamil Nadu for their outstanding work in conservation of genetic resources.
The award carried a cash prize of 10 lakh rupees each and have been instituted by the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers' Right Authority.
The awards are being given since 2009 to farming communities and farmers, particularly the tribal and rural ones, engaged in conservation, improvement and preservation of genetic resources of economic plants and their wild relatives particularly in the areas identified as agro-biodiversity hotspots.
