Hemant NitturkarProject Director

BASICS – Project overview and status

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Dr Barbara Wells, DG, CIPWelcome to Nigeria

WELCOME TO NIGERIA

WELCOME TO NIGERIA

• Population in 2015 – 182m• Population in 2050 – 392 m• % of people under 25 – 63• Median age – 17.9 years• Youth unemployment – 22%• % people in Agriculture – 50• Highly entrepreneurial

HUGE OPPORTUNITY FOR CIP IN YOUTH-LED SDG RELATED

INTERVENTIONS

Cassava is very important in Nigerian context to address hunger and livelihood

How well is cassava industry doing in Nigeria?

Target 20 tons per hectare

30%

30%

30%

10%

IMPROVED

VARIETIES

& SEEDS

WEED

MANAGEMENT

IMPROVED

AGRONOMY

WEATHER AND

MISC

7 m ha = 55 m tons (current)7 m ha = 140 m tons (possible)We are losing 85 m tons/year

25 m tons (30% of the additional 85 MT) can come from seed intervention alone

@20,000 Naira per ton, this is a 500 Billion Naira opportunity per annum

Situation and policy push make seed system intervention timely!

Five components of BASICS

Locations of project activities

Broad regions of project activity

KEY ACHIEVEMENTS SO FARSAH – RAPID MULTIPLICATION TECHNOLOGY

Set up at IITA, NRCRI and Shao Farm

Cassava seed tracker (CST) e-Certification innovation at NASC

Users

Producers Researchers Traders

Regulators Extension specialists Logistics/input dealers

Potential official tool for seed registration, inspection and certification

Flexible and customizable to end user needs, other crops, and country seed regulations

Village Seed Entrepreneurs(VSE)

• Over 100 VSEs set up in Benue and around Umudike

• First harvest out in 2017 season

• CRS and NRCRI implementation

• Out-scaling – MADE, GIZ

QUALITY SEED REGIME

• Diagnostic capability development at NASC under Fera, UK leadership

• International best practices from East Africa and UK

• NASC setting up a Center of Excellence for seed certification

• Certification protocols at Breeder, Foundation and Commercial seed levels

• Piloting private sector led third-party certification

Challenges being addressed

- Demonstrated value proposition of certified seed compared to the farmer saved seeds

- Integration between partners for seed class dependencies

- Institutionalising breeder seed multiplication at IITA (GoSeed) and NRCRI (NRCRI Consult)

- Developing attractive business cases for village seed enterprises, private sector foundation seed producers and SAH labs

The purpose the BASICS project is to develop a

sustainable cassava seed value chain in Nigeria,

characterized by the commercial production and

dissemination of cassava planting material. The project

envisages benefits to farmers and the industry through

higher returns from the use of clean planting material of

superior stem quality that are made accessible to

farmers at the right time and at an appropriate price.

THANK YOU