New Delhi: In her first public address after assuming the country's top job, President Pratibha Patil today emphasised on new policy initiatives to enhance agricultural growth.

"This is my first assignment after taking over as the President of India and the reason I am here is that everything can wait but not agriculture," Patil said.

"It would be important to bear in mind that our agricultural strategies should not only be pro-poor and pro-nature but also pro-women," the country's first women President said in her address on Agriculture and Food Security here.

It was essential to enlist the support of Panchayati Raj institutions and agricultural universities to empower farmers in both value added processing and marketing, she added.