KARACHI - Sindh Chief Minister (CM) Syed Murad Ali Shah has decided to invite Portuguese coaches to the city to train budding football players of Lyari.
Ambassador of Portugal Paulo Neves Pocunho called on Sindh chief minister here at the CM House on Thursday, and discussed matters relating to football, renewable energy and education exchange programmes with him.
The chief minister told the ambassador that the children of Lyari were passionate about football, and they had good teams as well. “But, I want to get them trained as professional players so that they could play international matches,” he said.
The visiting diplomat agreed with the CM on the need for hiring the services of football coaches for the training of talented children of Lyari.
The CM directed the Sindh Sport Department to officially invite the Portuguese coaches.
Furthermore, both agreed to start students exchange programmes for different graduate and post-graduate courses. The chief minister directed the University & Boards Department to coordinate with the Portuguese ambassador so that the programmes could see light of the day.
The chief minister said that Portugal had the latest technology for generating renewable energy. He said that Sindh had a vast wind corridor, which had the capacity of generating 50,000 MW of energy. “But so far, we have been able to generate only 1200 MW,” Murad said, and added that there was an issue of extraction of the renewable energy for which his government had formed a grid company.
The ambassador said that the Portuguese firms would love to work in renewable energy, wind and solar energy sectors with the Sindh government.
Therefore, the investment department and the department of energy was assigned the task to coordinate with the ambassador in this regard.
Later, the chief minister presented his shield, Ajrak and Sindhi Cap to the ambassador of Portugal.
Meeting with Canadian HC
Murad also met with Canadian High Commissioner (HC) Ms Wendy Gilmour here at the CM House. The meeting was attended by Behram Avari also.
The ambassador discussed with the CM $30 dollar worth educational programmes going on in Sindh with the assistance of the Canadian government.
The ambassador also offered to launch Mother-Child Health programme in three districts of the province, Badin, Shadadkot and Thar.
The chief minister said that in rural areas, women worked harder than men. “Our women have contributed to the development of national economy, particularly the rural economy,” he said, and added early childhood marriages was a social issue against which his government had enacted laws The chief minister also presented his shield and Ajrak to the guest.
Workshop on molecular biology held
The M.A.H. Qadri Biological Research Center of University of Karachi (KU), in collaboration with the Department of Botany (KU), organised a two-day workshop on “the application of molecular biology tools in biological research” here on Thursday.
The workshop explored the implications of the latest research on the DNA and protein and their uses in agriculture and medical science.
Director of M.A.H. Qadri Biological Research Center (KU) Professor Dr Ehteshamul Haque emphasized that the application of molecular biology tools in biological, agricultural and medical sciences was inevitable.
He told the audience that how molecular biology helped in the diagnosis of various plant and human diseases. He mentioned that with gene therapy we can treat many human diseases. “Important crops are threatened by a wide variety of plant diseases and pests,” he added.
