Dear colleagues,

On behalf of the Department of Management Sciences, we invite you to participate at an interesting talk by a well renowned Economist, Dr M Ejaz Qureshi who is a Research Program  Manager at Agricultural Development Policy (ADP), Australian Centre for  International Agriculture Research, (ACIAR), Canberra, Australia.

He will talk about ACIAR and share/provide lessons of our policy
research for the Pakistan?s agriculture sector and why policy research is
warranted. Please find attached a brief about the talk.

We will be pleased to have your participation at the session. We look forward to seeing you.

Event Details:
Date: Thursday 30 March 2017
Time: 02.00pm -04.00pm
Venue: Business Incubation Centre (BIC), CIIT Islamabad
Organizer: Department of Management
Sciences
Contact: drskouser@comsats.edu.pk

Further details about the presentation topic and speaker's bio-note are mentioned below.

Presentation Topic:

*ACIAR?s agriculture policy research in the IndoPacific region and lessons for Pakistan*

Despite having success and great potential to contribute to economic development, the agriculture sector (including horticulture, livestock and forestry) in Pakistan faces major challenges. These challenges include food security, water scarcity, deforestation, floods and droughts, low productivity, lack of well-functioning markets, lack of innovation and stagnant growth and development. Good agricultural policies and programs and institutional reforms are fundamental to address these challenges and to achieve the objectives of sustainable and profitable agriculture sector. However the scientific and empirical evidence is extremely important to formulate appropriate policies and programs. This is because it is generally a low cost process with high and immediate beneficial impacts and can avoid significant losses. In this presentation Dr Qureshi will talk about ACIAR?s policy focused research in the developing countries including Pakistan. He will then provide lessons and observations from these studies
to improve the agriculture sector in Pakistan and the role of policy research for evidence based appropriate policy interventions.

Bio-Note:

Dr M Ejaz Qureshi is Research Program Manager, Agricultural Development Policy (ADP), Australian Centre for International Agriculture Research (ACIAR), Canberra. ADP is one of the two research programs of ACIAR and operates in both the micro and macro dimensions and supports research for a more productive and sustainable agriculture. The program currently has 12 projects in about 10 countries in the IndoPacific region (including Pakistan, India, China, Indonesia, Vietnam and Fiji). Prior to joining ACIAR, he was a Senior Economist and Policy Analyst and Hydro-economic Team Leader in CSIRO, Adjunct Fellow in the Fenner School of Environment and Society and Associate in the Centre for Water Environment and Policy, the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University and Principal Research Economist in the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES) also in Canberra. Before moving to Canberra he worked at James Cook University in Townsville in the CRC for Sustainable Sugar Production and at the University of Queensland in the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute, Brisbane. Dr Qureshi did
his BSc Hons in Agriculture (Economics) and MSc Hons in Agricultural Economics (Marketing) from the University of Agriculture Faisalabad and Master in Agri Economic Studies and PhD in Resource Economics and Environmental Management from the University of Queensland-Brisbane. He was Associate Editor of the Journal of Hydrology and Guest Editors of the Hydrogeology Journal for its special issue: Economics of Groundwater Management and Food Security for its special issue: Feeding more than nine billion by 2050: challenges and opportunities. He has published about 100 scientific papers including journal articles, book chapters and conference papers on water management, environmental management, economic modelling, mathematical modelling, agricultural production,  economics and policy,
water policy, food security and policy and land use and forest management. He has reviewed articles for major international journals of agriculture and resource economics, water and food policy and environmental management. He has extensively contributed in and/or supervised projects in Australia, China, Pakistan, Indonesia and India. In recognition of his research
activities and their impacts, he was awarded by CSIRO the Land and Water Chief?s High Impact Studies Award and the Strategic Excellence Look Out Award in 2007 and the Social and Economic Science Program Award in 2012 and offered the Julius Career Award in 2013.

For and on behalf of Department's Marketing Team,

Kind Regards,

Hanniya Abid
Assistant Professor
Department of Management Sciences
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Islamabad