Lalitpur, Feb. 26: Environmental scientist at the american agriculture department and professor bruce a. Kiemthal gave a lecture on “Plant Growth and the Increasing Carbon-Dioxide Levels” at the Nepal Agricultural Research Council here on Friday.

Professor Kiemthal said that since carbon-dioxide plays an important role in the photosynthesis process, it helps a great deal in enhancing plant growth and crop yield.

Based on his study and experiments, it was found that increased levels of carbon- dioxide on tomato and paddy crops increased the production by 50 and 43 percent respectively. Currently researches are being carried out on the impact of increasing carbon-dioxide levels on the temperature of the soil, its humidity, evaporation, use of irrigation and light, humus content of the soil, microbes content of the soil, soil fertility and other factors.

It has been found that the level of carbon-dioxide has increased from 310 P.P.M. In 1960 to 370 P.P.M. In 2000 and studies have been conducted on the impact of increased carbon-dioxide levels on the cotton, orange, rye and wheat crops.

According to the Agricultural Research Council, the lecture was very insightful, useful and timely as well for agricultural research workers, planners and policy-makers in the light of the global climate changes and increasing carbon-dioxide levels in the earth’s atmosphere.

In Nepal also, a programme has been  formulated by the Agricultural Research Council for studying the impact of increased carbon-dioxide level on the country’s agriculture. The lecture was coordinated by senior agriculture scientist Dr. Kishor Kumar Sherchan of Nepal Agricultural Research Council.