CSIR works to improve yam seed
The Crops Research Institute of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR-CRI) has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with some commercial yam seed growers to produce improved yam seeds using aeroponics technology.
Advertisement
Aeroponics is an indoor gardening practice where plants are grown and nourished by suspending their root structures in the air and regularly spraying them with nutrients and water solution.
Under the agreement, the institute will supply the companies with planting materials and also provide technical and monitoring support for them.
The companies, on the other hand, will provide the land and structures to be used for the aeroponics.
The MoU, which forms part of activities under the Community Action in Improving Farmer-Saved See Yam (CAYSEED) project, is intended to formalise the yam seed production system and make more healthy seeds available to farmers.
Project coordinator
Explaining the rationale for the project, the Project Coordinator of CAYSEED, Dr Kingsley Osei, explained that even though there was the demand for yam seeds in the country, there was no formalised system by which those seeds were produced and made available to farmers.
He said unlike the maize, rice or beans sector where farmers could go to the market and buy those seeds for farming, there was nothing like that for those in yam production.
He said most farmers had to depend on harvested materials as seeds, and explained that that had led to low yields, as a result of planting diseased infested seeds.
Objective
Accordingly, he said, the project sought to make yam seed production formal and also increase yam production.
He said with the use of aeroponics for seed production, farmers would have access to healthier and cheaper seeds which had been proved to have higher yields.
Dr Osei said farmers would also produce at higher efficiency and increase yam production for export.
He said seed growers under the project would benefit from a grant of $10,000, both in cash and in technical support from the institute.
He said the funding was made possible through the support of the Bill & Melinda Gate Foundation.
Seed grower
Mrs Connie Aku Nyardoh, a seed grower, was grateful to the institute for the partnership, which she said would go a long way to help farmers in the country.
She said with the new technology, farmers would be able to grow yams throughout the year and not to wait for the yam season before planting.