The President of India, Smt Droupadi Murmu inaugurated the first ‘Global Symposium on Farmers’ Rights’ (GSFR) on Tuesday, in a ceremony held at ICAR Convention Centre, National Agricultural Science Centre, New Delhi.
President Murmu conferred the ‘Plant Genome Saviour Communities’ Award (6) and ‘Plant Genome Saviour Farmers Reward’ and ‘Plant Genome Saviour Farmers Recognition’ awards to the invited Indian farmers.
She also inaugurated the newly constructed ‘Plant Authority Bhawan’, the office of the PPVFR Authority, and an online plant variety ‘Registration Portal’.
Union Minister of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Shri Narendra Singh Tomar, MoS Shri Kailash Chaudhury and Secretary, Shri Manoj Ahuja were also present on the occasion.
She welcomed the delegates in the land of “Vasudhaiv Kutumabakam” (world is one family), a philosophy deeply ingrained in India’s culture and traditions. She said that farmers have toiled and enterprisingly developed or conserved landraces, wild-relatives and traditional varieties of crops, and provided the building blocks for the modern crop breeding programs, thus ensuring food and nutritional security for human beings and live-stocks alike.
