Agric expert says seed system critical to food security

An agriculture expert, Dr Perpetua Iyere-Usiahon, has described seed system as an innovation capable of promoting food and nutritional security in the country.

Iyere-Usiahon, Chief Agriculture Officer, Federal Ministry of Agriculture, made the remark while speaking at a Work Package 3 (WP3) stakeholders meeting in Onne, Rivers.

Speaking on the topic, “Government Policies in Accessing Vegetative Propagated Crops”, she said that the policies governing seed systems and markets across the world were changing rapidly.

Iyere-Usiahon said that in Nigeria, the National Seed Council, had been working tirelessly to ensure adequate access to improved and quality seeds for farmers.

The agric expert said that vegetative propagation of crops was a process in which plants were reproduced from stems, roots and leaves.

She listed grafting, layering, tuber, bulb or stolon formation, suckers and tissue culture as types of vegetative propagation.

“Crops that can be vegetatively propagated include ginger, turmeric, banana, potato, onion, sugarcane, yam plantain, cassava amongst others,” she said.

According to her, farmers across the world are already embracing the cultivation of vegetatively propagated crops.

Iyere-Usiahon urged both the producers and marketers of seeds and seedlings of vegetatively propagated materials to register with the national seeds council for operational licenses.

In her speech, Prof. Morufat Balogun, the Lead, Nigeria Geo-targeting Activities for WP3, SeedEqual Initiative, said the meeting was to develop a framework to coordinate demand and supply for target volumes of vegetative propagated crops and seeds.

Declaring the meeting open, Dr Richardson Okechukwu, the Head, International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, Onne Station, observed that farmers had continuously recycled old materials of farm seeds.

Okechukwu said that even when the improved seed materials were produced, they would not reach out to farmers for cultivation and better yield.

NAN / Foluke Ibitomi