ISSD Briefing Note September 2012 Uganda Seed Sector Assessment

ISSD Briefing Note September 2012 Uganda Seed Sector Assessment The seed sector at a glance The seed sector in Uganda compared with other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa is firstly characterized by the fact that the government recognizes both the formal and informal sectors in its policies and programmes. Although the government s capacity to support these sectors is limited, its position is rather unique. Uganda has developed a young and vibrant local seed industry, with 23 seed currently registered and active in the market. Their major product is hybrid maize; they do, however, produce and market quality seed of of several other crops. With regards to marketing, the benefit from the existence of more than 2300 registered agrodealers. Many of the make use of public services that provide access to, basic seed and quality control services, but capacities in delivering these public services are limited, which in turn limits growth and professionalism in the sector. The fact that the seed policy is in the process of being implemented provides an opportunity to further enhance the quality and perhaps capacities in service delivery, and also the professionalism of the various commercial players in the sector. Several non-governmental organizations (NGOs) support farmer-saved and community-based seed. These NGOs strengthen the farmers' groups in aspects of seed production, quality assurance, agri-business management, and seed marketing. The government of Uganda recognizes that this intermediary system fills a gap between the formal and informal seed systems. Seed systems assessment Farmers in Uganda produce between 80%-85% of their seed themselves. For food crops, they save part of their harvest as seed for the next planting season, and exchange seed among neighbours and relatives; they also buy grain at local markets for use as seed. For specific crops, like indigenous vegetables, spices and medicinal plants, smallholder farmers make a business out of collecting or producing seed and selling this at local markets. Several governmental and nongovernmental organizations support farmers groups in the production of standard seed. Public organizations provide access to clean seed and planting materials of and support NGOs in training farmers on agronomic, seed production practices. The seed produced is mainly used within the community, but is also distributed to other markets. This system covers crops like cassava, Solanum potatoes, beans, rice and some seed oil crops such as sesame and open pollinated sunflower. Farmers obtain nearly 20% of their seed from the formal system in Uganda. 23 registered national seed produce certified seed of hybrid and openpollinated varieties (OPVs) of field crops like maize, sunflower, and self pollinated crops such as groundnut, rice and beans, which have been developed by public breeding programmes. Seed is sold through a network of agro-dealers, as well as directly to input schemes of the government and NGOs. International import seed of hybrid maize, sunflower and exotic vegetables. The government strongly supports the cotton, coffee and cocoa value chain, and facilitates smallholder access to seed and planting materials; these are mainly produced through private seed, laboratories and nurseries. For other crops, like sugar cane, tea and flowers, the value chain is completely closed and the seed value chain is integrated in the product value chain, with only minimal government involvement. Briefing Note: page 1

Table 1. Characterization of seed systems in Uganda Characteristic Farmer-saved Individual farmer to farmer entrepreneur Communitybased National private Regional and multinational Cash crop value chains Closed value chains General description traditional for food and subsistence crops (informal) more entrepreneurial for local crops (informal) development oriented with support through NGO programmes (intermediary) emerging and vibrant system with many with strong focus on maize but including other crops, marketing through agrodealers or input schemes (formal) own varieties and basic seed; structured quality seed production, direct marketing and through agrodealers(formal) semi public and private system with distribution through commodity organizations (formal) closed systems with export commodities (formal) Type of crops food crops food and cash crops major food and cash crops major food and cash crops cash crops smallholder cash crops plantation and greenhouse cash crops Major crops beans, cowpea, pigeon pea, green grams, millets, sorghum, open pollinated maize, banana, sweet potato, cassava indigenous vegetables, spices and medicinal plants beans, rice, maize, sorghum, cassava, banana, sweet potato, potato, fruits maize (hybrid and OPV), sunflower, brewing sorghum, beans, rice, groundnut maize (hybrids), sunflower (hybrids) and, vegetables, pasture crops coffee, cocoa, cotton sugar cane, tea, oil palm, tobacco, flowers Type of varieties local varieties and introduce and recycled improved varieties local indigenous varieties public programmes public breeding private breeding public breeding programmes private breeding programmes Type of seed quality farmer-saved (informal) farmer-saved (informal) standard / qualitydeclared Certified/standard Certified/(Quality Declared Seed for Vegetables & pastures) quality quality Type of distribution and marketing farmer-saved and exchange, local markets local markets distribution and marketing marketing through agro- dealers and input schemes direct marketing and through agrodealers distribution and marketing seed import for use within value chain Briefing Note: page 2

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Seed-related programmes Public sector programmes in Uganda are mainly concerned with major food crops, such as maize, beans and cassava, but also smallholder cash crops like cotton and coffee; they support the private sector, but also intermediary and more informal seed systems. The National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO) runs public breeding programmes for these crops, and is responsible for the production of breeders seed and early generation seed. The public National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS) trains farmers and farmers groups in seed production, and links private seed and farmer seed producers to seed users. Institutions like the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) and the Cotton Development Organization (CDO) play a similar role to NAADs in facilitating access to seed and planting materials for smallholder producers. The Crop Protection Department of Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries is in charge of seed company licensing, variety release and cataloguing; import and export regulations; and seed quality assurance. The International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) provide examples of international organizations that run programmes directly supporting the public sector, facilitating breeding, variety selection and communitybased seed production activities. The Danish government, through its development assistance activity DANIDA, has provided support to the Ugandan seed quality assurance system; whilst the Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa (ASARECA) has supported the harmonization of seed policies and regulations for East Africa Community countries. Uganda has an emerging private sector with 23 national that mainly concentrate on the production of important food and cash crops like hybrid and OPV maize and sunflower, brewing sorghum, groundnut, rice and beans. These have access to improved materials and breeders seed by NARO s public breeding programmes. For hybrid maize and sunflower the national must compete with international, which benefit from their own variety development programmes. Private can use a network of 2300 established agro-dealers for seed marketing. Recently, for vegetatively propagated crops like banana, coffee, pineapple, cassava and Irish potato, private laboratories and nurseries, and large-scale farmers began to fill the gap in the supply and demand for quality planting materials. Programmes like PASS (Programme for African Seed Systems) of the Alliance for the Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) support the development of the private seed sector in Uganda e.g. through grants and investment funds for national seed ; and the strengthening of the agro-dealer network. Projects such as USAID- LEAD also support formal seed value chains. Through several international programmes, NGOs like Catholic Relief Services (CRS), Self Help Africa (SHA) and Volunteer Efforts for Development Concerns (VEDCO), with support from NARO and NAADS, assist farming communities in the production and distribution of quality seed and planting materials of several food and cash crops. Seed is mainly used within the producing communities. The facilitating organizations focus on strengthening the capacities of farmers groups in quality assurance, management, and seed marketing. These programmes have not yet incorporated the entrepreneurship component that is the strength of the Ugandan sector overall. Greater entrepreneurship at local level, could promote the seed supply for crops and varieties adapted to specific locations that are not easily addressed by the more national-oriented. In this way, the national seed sector would be able to better cover the wide spectrum of food and cash crops in all regions of the country. Seed-related policies Uganda has a draft national agricultural seed policy (2011) that is currently being reviewed for implementation. The goal of the national seed policy is to significantly contribute to increased agricultural production and productivity for improved standards of living and food security through the use of high quality seed. The seed policy recognizes the existence of two systems, i.e. the formal and informal seed systems. It puts an emphasis on public-private partnerships towards the development of a vibrant seed industry (formal system), with the public sector being responsible for providing an enabling environment for private investment. It aims to transform the informal seed system into a viable and commercial sector, through, for example, capacity building, linking the sector to research, creating sustainable formal markets, and establishing quality control mechanisms. Uganda aims to harmonize the national policies with regional and international conventions and protocols. The Seed and Plant Act (2006) is a legal framework that provides for the promotion, regulation and control of plant breeding and variety release, seed multiplication and marketing, seed import and export, and quality assurance of seeds and planting materials. The Seed and Plant Regulations (2009) provide guidelines for enforcement of the Act. The Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industries and Fisheries (MAAIF) discharges its role through the statutory agencies as provided for in the law, i.e. the National Seed Board (NSB; not yet in operation), Variety Release Committee (VRC), and National Seed Certification Services (NSCS) operating under the Crop Protection Department. NSCS is accredited to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for field seed certification. NSCS has applied for laboratory Briefing Note: page 4

accreditation to the International Seed Testing Agency (ISTA) to facilitate international seed trade. The Plant Variety Protection Bill (2010) that is currently before the Parliament of Uganda is another legal instrument aimed at granting plant breeders rights over their innovations, and attracting investment in the seed industry. The objective is to enable Uganda accede to the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). Uganda is party to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which aims to regulate the trans-border movement of germplasm. It is also a signatory to the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA), and to the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization. NARO is responsible for the conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources in Uganda. The link between practices, programmes and policies: challenges and opportunities The Government of Uganda aims to support a competitive, profitable, sustainable, market-led, regulated and coordinated seed industry. Currently, Uganda has a young seed industry with national seed facing many challenges. They have to compete with each other, producing seed of the same varieties resulting from public breeding programmes, and with international marketing seed of their own varieties. However, NARO is currently involved in exclusivity arrangements with national seed for maize hybrids, providing a space for them to compete in the seed market. The absence of a regulation for plant breeders rights limits the interest of foreign to become active in Uganda for marketing the seed of non-hybrid varieties. Where the market for maize seed is sufficiently profitable (more than 70% of the volume of formal seed is maize), other seed crops are more difficult to commercialize. The still largely depend on NGO and government seed buyers for crops like beans and groundnut. This hinders the direct buyer-seller relationship, and compromises the integrity of the seed industry. The sustainability and robustness of the overall seed sector is therefore questionable. Free seed distribution also constrains business development. The government closely coordinates the value chain development of smallholder cash crops that are important for export, like coffee. Market demand for the products of these crops increases the demand for quality seed and planting materials. Locally adapted varieties are available through public research, and private producers are becoming more and more active in the commercial production of seed and planting materials, with demand for quality seed and planting materials still to be met. The government links producers of seed and planting materials to users, with farmers increasingly having to pay market price for these inputs, instead of getting them for free. Seed quality assurance remains a major bottleneck in the system. Inadequate supply of foundation seed through public research enforces the recycling of commercial seed. The NSCS is under-capacitated to perform its official mandate of regulating and enforcing seed quality control mechanisms, and counterfeits are rampant on the market. Consequently, farmers have lost trust in formally produced seed, keeping the adoption rates at low levels. Within the informal system, several programmes focus on community-based seed production. The government supports these programmes, recognizing them as a bridge between the informal and formal seed systems; and aims to transform the informal system into a viable commercial sector. Programmes focus on the production of quality seed and planting materials of mainly resulting from breeding programmes run by NARO and the research centres of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). The emphasis in relation to seed production practices, seed quality issues, farmers group management, financial management, and commercial marketing arrangements differs from programme to programme. History shows that programmes are not sustainable if insufficient emphasis is given to seed entrepreneurship. Professionalizing farmers seed producer groups into local seed businesses, for producing and sustainably commercializing quality seed of locally demanded crops and varieties for a local market, may complement the efforts of national seed. Uganda has some experience with this model to the extent that some groups have now registered as commercial seed enterprises (e.g. Community Enterprises Development Organization - CEDO). Currently, there are no programmes that support the farmer-saved seed system and smallholder farmers seed entrepreneurs as such. Even though the (draft) seed policy recognizes the importance of the informal seed system in relation to the conservation of genetic diversity, this does not translate into specific programmes supporting the on-farm management of genetic resources; as a result, valuable genetic resources are being lost. Experiences in other countries in Africa and beyond show that programmes supporting communities in adding value to their local genetic resources, including capacity-building in local seed production for own use, may have a strong impact on improving the standards of living and the food security of marginalized communities, whilst at the same time contributing to agrobiodiversity conservation. Briefing Note: page 5

African Seed and Biotechnology Programme The African Seed and Biotechnology Programme (ASBP), which was adopted during the Eighth Ordinary Session of the Assembly of Heads of States and Governments of the African Union, in January 2007, aims to provide a strategic approach to the comprehensive development of the seed sector and related biotechnology in Africa, taking into account the different needs of the countries and regions. The programme pursues an integrated approach towards enhancing capacities for seed policy development and implementation; strengthening linkages between informal and formal seed sectors; ensuring further adherence to international norms and standards; stimulating the transfer of appropriate technologies and products; and encouraging publicprivate partnerships to promote the development of local seed enterprises. The Integrated Seed Sector Development (ISSD) in Africa programme is meant both to strengthen these processes and to contribute to the implementation of the programme at the level of national policies, supporting regional economic communities in their contribution to ASBP objectives. This makes the ISSD Africa programme timely and well placed to a continental and regional context. ISSD Africa II and the current ISSD Briefing Note The ISSD Uganda assessment of the seed sector is produced in the context of the ISSD Africa II programme. The activities in this ISSD Uganda programme are financed by the Directorate for International Cooperation (DGIS) of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands Government. ISSD Africa II is supported the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation (ELI) of the Dutch Government, Self Help Africa (UK/Ireland) and by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA). ISSD Africa is collaborative programme that is active in Burundi, Ethiopia, Ghana, Mali, Malawi, Mozambique, Uganda and Zambia. It includes partners from the public and private sector, NGOs, farmers organizations and universities, at national level in each country. ISSD Africa II and ISSD Uganda are coordinated by the Centre for Development Innovation of Wageningen University and Research centre in the Netherlands. The programme s international partners In ISSD Africa II are Wageningen University Law and Governance Group, Self Help Africa (SHA), IFDC (Eastern and West Africa Programmes), the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT), the Future Agricultures Consortium, Agri-ProFocus and the ACP-EU Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA). Briefing Note: page 6

Authors: Emmanuel Mubangizi, Diana Nandagire Ntamu, Wilfred Mwesigwa Thembo and Marja Thijssen Picture: Marja Thijssen (CDI) ISSD Africa II Uganda task force and members: Cliff Richard Masagazi, Uganda Seed Trade Association & Pearl Seeds, representing the private sector Ogwang Isaac, Self Help Africa, representing the NGO sector Richard Edema, Makerere University, representing knowledge institutions Emmanuel Mubangizi Consultancy team member-seeds and Entrepreneurship Diana Nandagire Ntamu, entrepreneurship consultant Julius Mukalazi, Abi Zonal Agricultural Research Institute, representing the public sector Wilfred Mwesigwa Thembo, ISSD Uganda programme, National Policy and Private sector Advisor Marja Thijssen, Centre for Development Innovation, Wageningen University and Research centre, the Netherlands, ISSD Africa programme coordinator Karèn Verhoosel, Centre for Development Innovation, Wageningen University and Research centre, the Netherlands, ISSD Uganda programme coordinator NB. It is proposed that the Commissioner Crop Protection will appoint an additional member to the task force ISSD Africa editorial team: Walter Simon de Boef, Gareth Borman and Elizabeth O Keeffe Centre for Development Innovation, Wageningen University and Research centre (CDI), Wageningen, the Netherlands ISSD Africa II is supported by: Briefing Note: page 7