Asif Sharif
Founder Chairman of Pedaver, and the engineer behind PQNK
Asif Sharif founded Pedaver on a simple observation: conventional agriculture's chemical-intensive model was trading long-term soil health for short-term yield, and that trade could not hold. Rather than refine that model, he set out to design a different one, grounded in how natural ecosystems have built fertility for hundreds of millions of years, long before industrial agriculture existed.
Five Decades in the Field
Sharif's engineering career began in 1973, importing farm implements and building out much of Pakistan's early mechanized agriculture infrastructure. Years of institutional resistance interrupted that work in the 2000s, a period he has described as ultimately shaping PQNK's core conceptual break rather than derailing it. A 2007 new beginning led directly to a 2008 field study of the Amazon rainforest, which identified the specific practices, soil inundation, tillage, bare soil, and monocropping, that disconnect conventional agriculture from how natural ecosystems sustain fertility. PQNK was developed and first field-tested that same year.
Read the Full Record
Five Decades of Agricultural Innovation is Sharif's own year-by-year account of the interventions above, from 1973 to today, documented in his own words, photographs and field data, available as a downloadable PDF and as a six-part narrated video series.
An Engineer Building the Tools PQNK Needed
Before PQNK could work at field scale, the machinery to apply it didn't exist, so Sharif designed it himself. His engineering work includes soil scrapers, fine laser levelers, ridgers and ditchers for land preparation without damage; raised bed shapers, compost banders and precision seeders that form a regenerative farm's physical infrastructure; and the VIPP (Vertical Insertion Precision Planter) and SIPP (Slit Insertion Precision Planter), which plant seed directly through thick mulch without disturbing the soil beneath it.
The Architect of PQNK
PQNK rests on a small set of non-negotiable principles: a strict no-till commitment that leaves roots and fungal networks undisturbed; permanent raised beds for drainage; a thick organic mulch layer that holds soil temperature in the 13–26°C range soil microbial life needs; and the living soil that results, where microbial activity converts the soil's own mineral reserves into nutrition, crop by crop. Documented results include reductions in water use of over 70%, the elimination of agrochemical inputs, and lower production costs alongside higher-quality output.
Self-Funded, By Design
PQNK's development and Pedaver's machinery have been funded entirely by Sharif himself, without external grants or corporate investment. It was a deliberate choice, intended to keep the system free of commercial pressure on its direction.
One Acre Prosperity
Sharif's One Acre Prosperity (OAP) approach is aimed at smallholders. It is designed to free farmers from the debt cycle of purchased chemical inputs and build financial independence from as little as a single acre. Having trained across five continents, he has also worked to bring global agribusiness knowledge and technology to farmers in Pakistan.
Beyond the Engineering
Asif Sharif was born into the SirGroh family of Faisalabad, a family with a long record in education and agriculture. Outside of Pedaver, he is known for his commitment to animal welfare, and for teaching his own family the same respect for soil and land that underpins his work.
Five Decades in Photos
From the first sugarcane harvester in 1977 to PQNK reaching national policy forums and international research institutions.
Origins
The founding decades — from imported machinery to the first PQNK field year.
Research & Institutional Ties
The collaborations that shaped PQNK's science.
The Policy Push
2019–2020: taking PQNK to government, academia, and farmers directly.
Recognition
2021–2023: PQNK reaching institutions and print.
As one colleague put it: Sharif didn't just build new machines. He built a new way of farming, one already written into nature itself.