Farmers, seeds and varieties Supporting informal seed supply in Ethiopia

Abstract

Ethiopia, located in the Greater Horn of Africa, has an estimated area of 112 million ha, of which 65% is suitable for arable agriculture. At present 15% of the area is cultivated for the production of major food crops. About 85% of its 70 million people are dependent on agriculture for their livelihoods. The Government of Ethiopia gives high priority to increasing the agricultural production and productivity in order to ensure food security, improve rural livelihoods and promote industrial development and growth. In this context, a well functioning seed system, providing the farmers with improved seeds of varieties of their choice is of paramount importance. In Ethiopia, as in many other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, the informal seed system is still the dominant system for seed supply: it is the system in which farmers select their crops and varieties, produce their own seeds, and/or locally exchange and purchase seeds. The proportion of seed supplied by the formal seed system is estimated to be around 10%. Ethiopia’s rich diversity in crops and varieties is vital for sustaining the livelihoods of subsistence farmers in the country’s diverse, complex and risk-prone environments; yet for some important crops the area covered with improved varieties is estimated to be less than 5%. There is a continuous process of exchange between the formal and informal systems, in information, in technology and, above all, in germplasm. Objectives o f the book This book addresses strategies and approaches through which professionals can support informal seed supply. These professionals w'ork in seed sector development, crop improvement and genetic resources management, or more generally in research and extension. The book also presents strategies for linking the support of informal seed supply with the conservation and use of the huge genetic resource base of crops and local varieties. The book is an output of the tailor-made training on the improvement of farmer-based seed production and revitalization of the informal seed supply of local crops and varieties in Ethiopia. The papers were written by the trainers, resource persons and participants of the one-year training programme. A number of additional papers cover interesting case studies and the experiences of experts in other regions of the world. In this book we tty to document and share the learning process of the training. The lessons learnt may be inputs in the further upscaling of approaches and strategies in supporting informal seed supply. We hope that the experiences will serve as an input in the discussions on the strategies and approaches for seed sector development, with the formal and the informal seed systems recognized for their own strengths and their complementarities. We hope that the book will contribute to the seed policy discussion, enabling the creation of policy regulatory frameworks that recognize farmers’ complex reality and the role of the informal seed system in seed supply, and stimulate formal sector organizations to get involve in activities supporting informal seed supply. We hope that the book will be of use to professionals in Ethiopia and beyond.