Auteur: Prem Nath

KRISHAN GOPAL AHUJA obtained his first university degree from The Punjab Agricultural College and Research Institute, Lyallpur, in 1944, with distinction. After serving the Department of Agriculture, the family moved after partition of India, to New Delhi and he joined the Horticulture Department, Government of India, at New Delhi in 1948. He proceeded for higher studies to USA in 1958 and earned MS (Landscape Design), and Ph.D (Horticulture) at Kansa State University, Manhattan, in 1960 and 1962, respectively. He has extensively traveled and visited several food processing factories, vegetable farms, glass house farms and gardens in England, France, Belgium, Scandinavian Countries, Sweden, Switzerland, Netherland and Italy.Dr. Ahuja has been working, in various capacities, in the Directorate of Horticulture, C.P.W.D., New Delhi, till his retirement as Additional Dirctor of Horticulture, in December 1983. He gained practical experience of growing and maintaining vegetable home gardens, fruit plants, herbs and ornamental features of the New Delhi Parks. As Colombo Plan Expert to the Government of Singapore for three years (1972-1975), he has been instrumental in establishing School of Landscape Planning and Ornamental Horticulture for the ASEAN countries at Botanic Gardens, Singapore and as a Senior Lecturer, taught landscape design, soil science and horticulture for three years. He also served as FAO consultant in Nigeria (1982-83) and Yemen (1989).Dr. Ahuja has been a Member of several national and international professional societies/bodies. After retirement, he has been Consultant to various organizations and societies.Dr. Ahuja has several papers, published and unpublished to his credit. His first lecture to the staff of the Department on “Medicinal Values of Indian Herbs” in 1965, induced him to write a book on this subject. In 1979 and 1980, his publications in the Indian Journal of Ornamental Horticulture, entitled Large and Tall Trees; Medium and Small Trees and their Landscape and Medicinal Values and presentation of a paper, entitled “Our Vegetables and Their Phytochemicals” at the International Conference on Vegetable (ICV) at Bangalore in 2002 are highly valued. During 2002 and 2009 Dr. Ahuja made a considerable study on food and nutrition. Now Dr. Ahuja is 84 and is residing in USA. Prem Nath obtained his Ph.D. degree in Horticulture from the Kansas State University in U.S.A.during 1962. The same year, he returned to India and served at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (New Delhi), University of Udaipur (Jobner), Indian Institute of Horticultural Research (Bengaluru) before joining the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and served as Project Leader in a number of countries, like Indonesia, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Yemen Arab Republic, Italy, Myanmar, and Thailand, for about 25 years, with the last posting as FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific and headed FAO Regional Office in Bangkok, Thailand from where he retired in 2000. Even on his retirement with the FAO, Dr. Nath continues his activities on issues of food and agriculture/horticulture through the Dr. Prem Nath Agricultural Science Foundation (PNASF) to which he has donated his life-savings.The vegetable varieties developed by him and his colleagues are still popular in India and abroad. He guided researches on vegetables for a number of M.Sc and Ph.D students. In 1965, Dr. Nath authored the book entitled ‘Cucurbitaceous Crops in Northern India’ published by the University of Udaipur, Rajasthan. Among several publications, the book on ‘Vegetable Crops for the Tropical Region’ published by the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR), New Delhi, in 1976 and 1987 and reprinted in 1994 and 2004 are still popular among the Agricultural Universities in India. The new book entitled “Food Security and Vegetables – A Global Perspective” published by the PNASF in 2004 and written by the well-known international authors acclaimed high recognition nationally and world-wide. He is also a co-author of the book –”State of the Indian Farmer: A Millennium Study” published in 2004 by the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperation, Government of India. His recent book entitled “Vegetable Crops – Improvement and Production” is popular among the university students and scientists. Dr. Nath has hundreds of publications and technical reports published in India and abroad. Dr. Nath has the credit of establishing horticultural research institutes in India, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Yemen and of guiding Agriculture / Horticulture research programs in Africa, near East, Asia and East European countries. In 1994, he was responsible for launching successfully the FAO’s Special Programme on Food Security for Low-Income Food Deficit Countries (LIFDC’s) across the globe. He has promoted a number of programs on nutrition security, particularly among the children.Presently, Dr. Prem Nath is the Chairman of the Dr. Prem Nath Agricultural Science Foundation (PNASF), Bengaluru. As a Chairman of the Organizing Council of the International Conference on Vegetables (ICV-2002), he successfully organized the Conference held during November 2002 at Bengaluru where about 700 delegates from about 40 countries participated. He is the Fellow of a number of national and international professional societies / academies in Horticulture and Agriculture.