Speakers

Muhammad Farooq

Place of Birth : Pakistan
Position : Head of Department of Plant Sciences at the Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Oman
Field of study : Sustainable agriculture and food security

Dr. Muhammad Farooq is Head of Department of Plant Sciences at the Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Oman. He also holds the positions of Adjunct Professor at the University of Western Australia (from 2011 to date) and Visiting Professor at the Dankook University, South Korea (from 2013 to date). He had also been working at the International Rice Research Institute, Philippines (2007-2008), Centre of Environment and Life Sciences, CSIRO Plant Industry, Australia (2010); University of Giessen, Germany (2011-2012), and University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany (2016), University of Agriculture, Faisalabad (2004-2017), King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (2012-2017). Dr. Farooq is the recipient of fellowships from the Japan International Research Centre for Agricultural Science (2007), Australian Endeavour Awards (2010), and Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany (2011, 2016). He also remained Young Affiliate fellow of The World Academy of Sciences (2014-2018) and is a member of Global Young Academy and Pakistan Academy of Sciences. He was the recipient of the Research Productivity Award from the Pakistan Council of Science and Technology from 2007 to 2017. He received ‘Best Young Research Scholar Award’ from the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan for the years 2013, 2014, and 2015. He was honored with the COMSTECH Award for Excellence in Research (2016) by Organization of Islamic Conference, Gold Medal (2017) by Pakistan Academy of Sciences, and the best University Teacher Award (2018) by the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan. He also received the Best Researcher Award (2019) from Sultan Qaboos University, Oman, the Best Research Group Award (2020 and 2022) from Sultan Qaboos University, Oman. He was also named the ‘Highly Cited Researcher’ by the Clarivate/Web of Sciences for four consecutive years 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021. His research has encompassed providing an understanding of the response of crops to abiotic stresses. He has developed seed enhancements for improving crop performance under less-than-optimum conditions and for the delivery of micronutrients. He devised technologies for cost-effective biofortification of grain crops with zinc and iron. He is among the pioneers to develop non-chemical weed control, through allelopathy, in field crops. He optimized, developed, and popularized conservation agricultural systems In Pakistan and Oman. Dr. Farooq has edited and co-edited thirty-five books and authored and co-authored more than 425 research articles and 50 book chapters. His citations, on Google Scholar, exceed 44,000 with an H-index of 97.

Experiences

• Head of the Department, Department of Plant Sciences, Sultan Qaboos University, Al-Khoud-123, Oman from September 10, 2021 to date.
• Associate Professor, Department of Plant Sciences, Sultan Qaboos University, Al-Khoud-123, Oman from September 10, 2017 to date.
• Adjunct Associate Professor, The Institute of Agriculture, University of Western Australia (UWA), Perth, Australia from September 30, 2014 to date.
• Associate Professor, Department of Agronomy, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan from May 29, 2013 to 09 September 2017.
• Visiting Professor, Dankook University, Cheonan, Republic of Korea from June 01, 2017 to date.
• International Professor, College of Food and Agricultural Sciences, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia from December 22, 2017, to December 21, 2018.
• Guest Professor, Institute of Agricultural Sciences in the Tropic, University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany from May 16, 2016 to August 13, 2016
• Visiting Professor, College of Food and Agricultural Sciences, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia from December 25, 2013, to February 17, 2016.
• Guest Scientist, Institute of Plant Nutrition, Justus-Leibig University, Giessen, Germany from July 01, 2011, to June 26, 2012.
• Adjunct Lecturer, The Institute of Agriculture, University of Western Australia (UWA), Perth, Australia from September 30, 2011 to September 29, 2014.
• Visiting Research Fellow, The Institute of Agriculture, University of Western Australia (UWA), Perth, Australia from June 14, 2010 to October 30, 2010.
• Assistant Professor, Department of Agronomy, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan from October 04, 2006 to May 28, 2013.
• Visiting Research Fellow, Plant Breeding, Genetics and Biotechnology (PBGB) Division, International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), Los Baños, Philippines from May 10, 2007 to May 09, 2008.
• Lecturer, Department of Crop Physiology, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan from July 01, 2004 to October 04, 2006.
• Scientific Officer, Pakistan Agricultural Research Council, from February 14, 2004, to June 30, 2004.