Million-dollar vote of confidence from Mexican farmers and
state officials
Nobel Peace Laureate Norman E. Borlaug anchors the
announcement of a global, Cornell-coordinated project to
combat a deadly wheat disease, and a Mexican farmer
organization and Sonora officials pledge a million dollars
for CIMMYT's work to secure wheat harvests for developing
country farmers.
Home-grown maize seed solutions in southern and central
Africa
Not content to let the lack of maize seed from the large,
commercial companies deter maize production by small-scale
farmers, community-based seed producers are moving in to
fill the gap in southern and central Africa.
Victor Mulongo Mukalay, a
former member of parliament, is now emerging as a
small-scale maize seed entrepreneur in his home region of
Lubumbashi, in Katanga province, in the Democratic Republic
of Congo (DRC). In a province with nearly 750,000 households
of small-scale farmers planting an average of 530,000
hectares of maize, it is unusual that there is no commercial
seed company. Mukalay is working with his neighbors on three
hectares of land to produce maize seed to fill this gap, and
is planning to acquire a maize seed processing machine to
enable him expand the scale of his operations.
“Although this is our first season, I’m very optimistic
we’ll meet our target of producing enough good seed for 300
farm households,” he says. “I’d like to contribute in my
small way to increasing the availability of quality seed of
improved maize varieties for small-scale farmers.” Mukalay
and his neighbors are multiplying breeders’ seed they
receive through CIMMYT’s New Seed Initiative for Maize in
Southern Africa (NSIMA). They are using the open-pollinated
varities ZM623 and ZM721—developed by CIMMYT in Zimbabwe but
showing good adaptability in the DRC. Variety ZM623,
developed through CIMMYT research on drought tolerant maize
for sub-Saharan Africa, is particularly popular with
farmers, who like its intermediate maturity, disease
resistance, and grain type.
“We’re encouraged by this interest from community-based seed
producers who are investing their own resources in maize
seed multiplication,” says John MacRobert, CIMMYT Zimbabwe
seed specialist and NSIMA coordinator. “This will surely
increase the availability of improved varieties to
small-scale growers.”
Empowering farmers through partnerships
Two years ago, a cooperative project between World Vision
International (WVI), Swaziland’s national research and
extension system, and CIMMYT began working with a farmers’
group in rural Swaziland, providing technical and financial
support for community-based seed production. Today, 86
farmers are proud owners of Lesibovu Community Company,
involved in the seed production and marketing of the
popular, drought tolerant variety ZM521. This season they
will start producing and marketing certified seed of the
newly released variety ZM611.
“The training we received from CIMMYT in seed production,
certification, and marketing aspects was very useful in
helping us scale up our production from just 25 kilos to
approximately 41,000 kilos of seed annually,” says John
Mamba, the group’s chairman. “We now feel empowered to
produce good quality seed.” The company has purchased a
simple seed packaging machine and developed its own
packaging label.
“It was necessary to build the group’s capacity in producing
open-pollinated varieties and hybrids, seed inspection
procedures, and maize seed standards,” says Peter Setimela,
CIMMYT maize breeder. “This was the only way of ensuring
that they supply high-quality seed and of making them
competitive in the market.”
Home-grown seed is best
The South African government, through the Limpopo Province
Department of Agriculture, is also supporting similar
initiatives. Although they began just eight years ago, these
production have taken root and today are supplying as much
as 5,000 kilograms of improved maize seed to hundreds of
small-scale farmers who previously had little access to
improved maize varieties. The bigger seed companies did not
consider it good business sense to supply thousands of
widely-dispersed, small-scale farmers. Through strategies
such as marketing the seed in smaller, more affordable
packets and working with rural traders, the schemes have
increased access to and uptake of varieties such as ZM421
and ZM521. Farmers prefer ZM421, another variety from
CIMMYT’s work, because of its comparatively stable yield,
drought tolerance, and early maturity. The latter was
especially attractive, because it eases the burden of
guarding the crop from marauding baboons, a major menace.
Farmers have also found ZM521 to be high-yielding and
early-maturing, with good milling properties.
The South African National
Seed Organization (SANSOR) has been involved in the
certification of seed from the small-scale production
schemes since 2002. SANSOR works closely with farmer
producers to ensure their seed is of the required quality.
Producers must register seed plots within 28 days after
sowing, have plots inspected at different plant growth
stages, and present seed samples for certification.
Being in close contact with farmers makes it easier to
include their feedback in varietal improvement research or
in key aspects of seed production, meaning for example that
the varieties developed can be better suited to farmers'
cropping settings.
Maize is a major food staple not just in South Africa but in
most of sub-Saharan Africa. Through NSIMA, the South African
government is investing in training and extending financial
and material assistance to community-based seed producers.
This in turn helps ensure small-scale farmers access to
affordable, quality seed of improved maize varieties,
enhancing their food security and incomes.
For more information:
John MacRobert, seed systems specialist.
Hungry sheep and conservation agriculture in Mexico
A recent intensive course at CIMMYT's Toluca experiment
station in central Mexico shows researchers and extension
workers the real-life complexities of conservation
agriculture for rainfed maize farming.
