Rice Research Institute of Iran (RRII) Was Attended the First Webinar Meeting of Agricultural Research, Education and Extension (AREEO) and Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences (YAAS)
The Director-General of the Academic Relations and International Affairs (ARIA), Dr. Valinasab, of the Agricultural Research, Education and Extension (AREEO) organized the First Webinar Meeting of Agricultural Research, Education and Extension (AREEO) and Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences (YAAS) to follow up the progress of the development and execution of the joint research projects in the main fields of the Action Plan, including wheat, oilseed, tea, mushroom, silk, flowers and ornamental plants and knowledge management as well as rice in order to strengthen the bilateral cooperation between AREEO and YAAS. This high level committee meeting was held on 10th May, 2021, participated by Dr. Bazargan deputy of Jahad-Agriculture and director general of Agricultural Research, Education and Extension (AREEO); Dr. Arzhang Javadi vice president of Agricultural Research, Education and Extension (AREEO); Dr. Valinasab, director –general of ARIA- AREEO, Dr. Balali, Senior advisor of Dr. Bazargan; Dr. Amirhosseini, -YAAS relation coordinator, Dr. Abbasi Moghadam, focal point of AREEO-YAAS collaborations, DR. Mahmoudsoltani representative of RRII; Dr. Faraji, representative of the agricultural and natural resources research center of Gorgan province; representative of Ornamental Plant Research Center (OPRC), Dr. Padasht, representative of Horticulture Sciencess Research Institutes (HSRI) (Tea sector); Dr. Sourati Zanjani, representative of Iranian Silkworm Research Center (ISRC) from Islamic Republic of Iran, AREEO, and from Yunnan academy of agricultural sciences, Dr. Xuelin Li, President of YAAS; Dr. Luyuan Dai, Vice President of YAAS; Dr. Wang; Dr Yanjie Luo, Director General, International Cooperation Division of YAAS; Xueli Hu, ICRI, YAAS; Jiwei Ruan, FRI, YAAS, Dr. Yichun Tang, TRI, YAAS; Dr. Du Wei, SARI, YAAS; Dr. Mingju Li, FCI, YAAS; Dr. Kaimei Su, BGGRRI, YAAS ; Dr. Dr. Na Yang.
In the beginning, Dr. Valinasab moderator of the meeting, and Dr. Luo introduced the AREEO and YAAS members, respectively, and both of them briefly explained the purpose of this high-level webinar meeting.
Dr. Luo and Dr. Valinasab in their opening speech emphasized that despite the covid-19 pandemic concern on both sides, it is a strong necessity to follow up the achievement and analysis of the progress of work in the realization of joint research-executive projects and emphasized the singed action plant through a series of webinars between AREEO and YAAS.
Dr. Li, president of YAAS as the first key speaker said: Thank Dr. Bazargan for this meeting. Iran is an important country on both island and sea and also Iran and China have friendly relationships from ancient times. By the challenges of covid-19 for human beings, the friendly exchange negatively influenced. Today is the first symposium of join commission to push action plan between AREEO and YAAS which is a positive and pragmatic move on both sides to implement MoU and action plan we singed before and promote and initiate them. He also added that we have to establish operative relations with our research institute and international organizations. He wishes despite the concern of covid-19 we can promote and initiate the action plans in detail and as soon as possible.
Dr. Bazargan deputy of minister and director-general of AREEO in her opening speech said:
Your Excellency President of Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Dear Scientists. It is my pleasure to attend this meeting and express my willingness to expending the Agricultural Research, Education, and Extension Organization (AREEO) binding with Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Science (YAAS) and expanding joint cooperation between two organizations.
The main mandate of the AREEO is to develop and manage all research activities of agriculture and natural resources in the Ministry of Agriculture Jahad. AREEO with 19 nationwide research institutes including multidisciplinary and crop-based research centers, 34 Provincial Research and Education Centers; 360 research stations, farms, and bases; 34 agricultural extension directorates; 1213 district extension centers; and 142 knowledge-based enterprises is considered as the largest national agricultural research system (NARS) in the middle east. Over 10,000 employees including nearly 3000 scientists are working at AREEO’s research and education institutions in various programs. As Iranian agriculture encompasses various production systems of crops, fruit trees, livestock animals, aquatics, and a wide range of agro-biodiversity, the priorities for agricultural research also include many disciplines and hundreds of research topics.
In the present condition that the I.R. Iran and P.R. China have established ties based on “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership”, We are glad to deepen our cooperation base on our AREEO/YAAS MoU that started with the first action plan of 28 joint projects in the area of wheat, oilseed, tea, mushroom, silk, flowers, ornamental plants, and knowledge management as well as rice in order to strengthen the bilateral cooperation between AREEO and YAAS. Once in a while, I control the progress of our plan of action and one of the main priorities in AREEO is to make more activation of this MoU. As a new policy of AREEO, we are moving towards ONE-AREEO with emphasis on “Comprehensive Projects” in which the 28 joint-projects are considered as a part of these Comprehensive Projects.
On the other hand, it was a great opportunity that YAAS awarded five grants to AREEO Researchers and I would appreciate and emphasize that to have your support for dispatching them to China as soon as possible.
We wish for very fruitful and successful cooperation from now and we hope to strengthen scientific activities in relation to increasing self-reliance in the agricultural sector.
The next speaker was Dr. Luyuan Dai, the vice president of YAAS that briefly said: The pandemic of covid-19 negatively influenced and change the program of the visit of AREEO and YAAS. As mentioned by Dr. Bazargan we can not stop our friendly cooperation. Today we through face-to-face online meetings try to promote the singed action plans. The YAAS priority is to explore and promote the MoU and action plans. At the end of her speech by introducing their roles of YAAS to train of the young scientists in Asia said: We hope under action plan framework we can train more researchers from Iran.
Dr. Arzhang Javadi, the vice president of AREEO was the next key speaker of this meeting that clearly define the AREEO strategies in the YASS-AREEO MoU. He said: Excellencies, Dr. Li, and Dr. Bazargan
First of all I would like to thanks the all colleagues in YAAS and AREEO for organizing such a valuable and great meeting between parties. As his Excellencies, Dr. Bazargan explained the roles, missions, and strategies of AREEO at all affiliated institutes, main centers, and stations that showed AREEO is a very big organization right now. I would like also to remain prof. Dr. Khavazi, minister of Jahad- Agriculture, who was the former deputy of AREEO and deputy of minister of Jahad-Agriculture who had very important roles to sign such a valuable MoU.
I believe that it is a very mature MoU and regarding MoU between two parties we have to launch 28 research projects that are very important for us and 5 semantically grants for our researchers. I am sure that all of you inform that Iran is very rich in terms of genetic resources and variation of agricultural products, unique because of four definite seasons and climate conditions which enable us to produce various agricultural crops. Also, aquaculture is very important for us and also we believe that we can share, exchange many genetic resources between two countries to produce new crops and research fields. We define our priorities, research topics recently which likely some of them are under the list of 28 research projects of wheat, Oilseed, flower, and rice that have a high impact on our farmers. We also believe that research and innovations are the only gateways or the shortcut to solve and face the challenges. We also know about the natural resources crisis, limitation, and shortage of irrigation water, soil and climate conditions.
We need a sort of issues that affect the agricultural product for the world and country scale food security. Also, we know about the problems of world trade problems due to various constraints and we need to think about self-sufficiency. Therefore, research and innovation are the most important shortcut to solve all problems.
Through these projects, we can share our experiences. We are very happy that the MoU start to move with a great effort of both sides and I kindly request we have to define a clear timetable for these research projects in this meeting or the next coming meeting. We hope with following the clear timetable we reach the goals as soon as possible.
In continuing, the research project leaders explained the proposal and progress reports of all engaged institutes.
Dr. Mahmoud Soltani, representative of RRII, in his progress report pointed out: Honorable delegates good morning, Dr. Hossieni, director-general of RRII request me to express, on her behalf, our thanks and gratitude to Dr. Bazargan, Dr. Javadi from AREEO, and DR. L and Dai from YAAS for this new collaboration window and for all facilities which will undoubtedly highly contribute to the success of this meeting.
According to a decision made on the previous meeting that was held on Dec. 25, 2019, on the RRII and between AREEO and RRII (Dr. Hosseini director-general of RRII), and the YAAS team (DR. WANG former vice president of YAAS) two sides had been agreed on three subjects: Perennial rice germplasm providing with YAAS, biological control of rice disease projects, and hybrid rice technology transfer by YAAS.
All three agreed subjects still are in progress. We hope by breaking down Covid -19, all of them successfully done.
At the end of this meeting both sides by emphasizing the importance of this type of collaborations, decided to fully support of MoU and singed action plan.