Getting Improved Seed to Smallholder Farmers: Findings from The African Seed Access Index

Perspectives in International Development Seminar Series

Timely availability of improved seeds at affordable prices is critical to increased productivity by smallholder farmers in Africa.  Improved seeds can deliver state of the art technology to farmers including higher yields, disease and pest resistance, climate change adaptation, and improved nutrition.  Over the last two decades, formal seed systems in Africa have been gradually liberalized resulting in increased participation of private seed enterprises (multinationals, regional and domestic companies). However, in most countries, the public sector often hinders or competes with private sector.  This seminar shares the latest findings from The African Seed Access Index (TASAI), a tool that monitors the development and competitiveness of national seed sectors in Africa.  The central objective of TASAI is to encourage African governments and development agencies to create and maintain enabling environments that will accelerate the development of local private sector-led seed systems serving smallholder farmers.

About the presenter

Ed Mabaya is an academic and a development practitioner.  He is involved in several programs that seek to improve the lives of African farmers through private enterprises.  He has more than a decade of research and outreach experience in the development of Africa’s seed sector.  Ed earned his MS and Ph.D. degrees in Agricultural Economics at Cornell University and his B.Sc. from the University of Zimbabwe. He is the outgoing President of African Association of Agricultural Economists (2017-2019). Mabaya was an Archbishop Desmond Tutu Leadership Fellow (2007) and The Aspen Institute’s New Voices Fellow (2016).

About the seminar series

The "Perspectives in International Development Seminar Series" is co-sponsored by the Department of Global Development, the Department of Natural Resources, the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, and the School of Integrative Plant Science.