Yemen Observer: http://www.yobserver.com
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Written By: Mohammed Humaid al-Aswadi
Article Date: Jul 12, 2008 - 4:46:34 AM
The Yemeni Genetic Center jointly held a workshop with Sana’a University Water Research Center with 17 participants from 6 Arab countries: Yemen, Tunisia, Jordan, Morocco, Palestine and Egpyt to discuss demand management of water resources and to exchange expertise.
The workshop focuses on issues hindering water demand management policies.
The workshop aims to enhance dialogue between experts in the agricultural and water conservation fields and pool the knowledge of different Arab countries. The aim is to boost water demand management at the regional level, to support regional decision makers and an experts’ network for bridging the gap between the different governmental, researchers and NGOs’ organizations.
It will determine the necessary scientific research for setting a scientific vision to support water demand management with legislative benchmarks as well as communal partnership laws for feasibility studies of conservation.
The aim is to guarantee equal water sources, distribution and usage rationalization to guarantee its sustainability for eonomic and social development.
The Yemeni Genetic Center is considered to be one of the most important specialized centers at Sana’a University that works on local biodiversity knowledge. The Center witnesses an increase in the scientific and agricultural activities at the universities and the research centers, and is expanding its work to cover Yemen at large.
The establishment plan was set in 1997 and most of it depended on the access to genetic and botanical recourses, which can be modified and used for educational purposes, as well as for the production of agricultural and plant varieties that can meet production needs. Genetic recourses are diversified in a country like Yemen, having varied climates and environments. The preservation and protection of genetics from extinction, which is now becoming an international concern for many countries and organizations, is also one of the objectives. These activities are scarce in Yemen, yet the availability of essential tools as well as the technical scientific research capacities qualified the Center for the accomplishment of its planned objectives. The Center also finds special attention from Dr. Khalid Tomaim, Sana’a University’s rector.
There is an important extinction threat for agricultural and natural plant genetic resources, which constitute thousands of years of the basic history of Yemeni agriculture. They are the natural archive of the activities which were practiced since the domestication, selection and preservation of wild plants. They are also the map of the best selected agricultural wild plants that managed to adapt themselves with the environment and survive the climate and environmental changes, at the same time that they stand as the natural, historical, geographical and environmental genetic archive of Yemen and Arabia, which can thus give a chance for generating a method for managing natural human resources.
The continuous environmental and climate change experienced because of direct and indirect damages caused by human activities, threatens many plant and animal species with extinction. The cost of such extinctions will be the loss of the pivotal animal and plant genetic reserves that are vital in producing varieties that suit Yemen’s environment.
This is one of the reasons why the faculty researchers are encouraged to start the Center’s establishment in order to preserve the loss of animal and plant genetic resources before it is too late. They recommended the recovery of the species which were collected by international centers such as Russian scientists (Fafilof and his team) at the beginning of the last century, and the species collected by the American universities and organizations, the International Genetic Banks and the FAO organization.
The faculty has significant equipment, enabling it to accommodate the Center. An example of these are: a special building with a cooling room which can accommodates more than 20,000 plant species, a laboratory designed for biological techniques and tissue’s culture as well as germination rooms and laboratory equipments which can change this strategic dream into reality.
The Center seeks to mobilize the university, the public and private research and rehabilitation efforts in order to preserve, develop and utilize bio diversity to secure the sustainability of the natural recourses by:
- Collection of different plant genetic species, (agricultural crops, pastoral, vegetables, ornamental plants, natural plants,) from every Yemeni agricultural climate, together with their necessary natural environmental and human activity information for the labels.
- Description, assessment and categorization of each collected plant species at the laboratories or the farms, in order to complete their information plan and labels.
- To keep samples, seeds, brain plant parts, or pollen grains. - Proliferation of the different agricultural species that will be used in genetic improvement programs.
- To conduct scientific studies regarding the genetic attrition of the species. - To establish naturally preserved areas and plant gardens, in cooperation with the different bodies.
- To take advantage of studies, preservations and assessments of genetic animal resources in the genetic improvement implementations.
- To document the domestic agricultural experience, which is an indispensable legacy that can be utilized in sustainable agricultural development.
The Center’s objectives:
- To collect all Yemeni pets and wild plants and conduct scientific studies on the environmental and attrition impacts.
- To categorize, describe and assess the collected samples to complete their informational plan and identification labels.
- To renew and proliferate the collected preserved sources, and produce the origins of the genetically modified seeds.
- To make advantage of the genetic recourses in the genetic educational and improvement program for improved progenies.
- To prevent rare species extinction and establish natural protection sites.
- To find decease and pet resisting species.
- To collect and document the domestically acquired knowledge which is related to the utilization of natural recourses.
- To launch specialized training, educational and rehabilitation programs on genetic resources and bio diversity.
- To publish different kinds of magazines,
publications and the research and studies of the Center’s findings in agreement with the Center and the university’s regulations.
The Center provided a comprehensive building containing the essential preliminary equipments, cooling rooms with 20,000 sample capacity at the long and medium phases, a laboratory designed for bio technical tissue culture, growth rooms as well as a sample keeping and a proliferation farm. Another new farm is being established as well as a glass cell. The specialized staff of the Faculty of Agriculture is another addition to the Center.
The Center is managed by a board consisting of the faculty’s relevant divisions. The executive manager is the administration’s representative.
The Center has several supporting projects donated by local authorities, such as the “Uncared for plants project,” in cooperation with the Agricultural Research Authority and the “Project of town garbage’s conversion into fertilizer,” a project financed by the Agricultural and Fishery Encouragement Fund.
Regarding cooperation with the donating organizations, the bulk aid is now provided by the International Canadian Development Research Center (ICDRC), which is funding a special project looking into the traditional local cereals and legume related foods, in Yarim and Bani Matar areas. The project accomplished marvelous outcomes, but it will be phasing out in the short time to come. It is hoped that the ICDRC will continue to carry out a second stage of the project, based on the findings of the first stage.
