Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU) yet again entered the top 10 in ICAR 2019 rankings. The university had ranked 33 in the previous year. However, the university scored 8th rank in the ICAR (Indian Council for Agricultural Research) latest raking by showing enormous progress.
TNAU had a drop to 33rd position in the previous years by the ICAR ranking for not producing quality research. Being criticized for not producing quality research the university took a series of measures to improve its ranking.
However, the university took some major steps in increasing the rank by Quantitative increase of paper publications, an invitation to more external agency funded schemes, and increasing recognition in the international scene.
TNAU has obtained 8th rank among the 67 agricultural institutes, 4th among the state agricultural universities and 1st among the southern agricultural universities.
The universities rank dropped to 27th position in the year 2017 which was followed by 33rd rank in 2018 and the top ranks were bagged by the ICAR Indian Agricultural University, ICAR National Dairy Research, and the Punjab Agricultural University.
Vice-Chancellor of TNAU, N Kumar mentioned that the drop of ranks affected the perception of the university among the general populace and also affected the grants that were being released to the University.
The Vice-Chancellor also added students were guided by the faculties to take up more junior and senior research fellowships. This key factor played a major role in the rise in rankings. He also gave all the credits to the scientist who mobilized funds through external agencies to publish their research.
The Vice-Chancellor further said, for the future they would hope for an even better ranking in the ICAR which would allow the University to rope in more international students and also increase the diversity among the student population.
He closed the speech by saying the University would continue to empower farmers strive on the path of research and attract more avenues for collaborative research to empower farmers.
