Three crop scientists in Uganda, based at the National Crops Resources Research Institute (NaCRRI), have earned international recognition for developing disease-resistant varieties.
Dr Goretti Ssemakula, Dr Stanley Nkalubo and Dr Charles Kasozi have been named global ambassadors for biofortification of major staple food crops, including sweet potatoes, maize and beans.
The biofortification campaign enlists scientists producing high-yielding, virus-resistant and drought-tolerant crop varieties through multiple crossing of conventional plant breeds.
Dr Ssemakula is the brains behind the orange sweet potatoes, commonly-known as kipaapali, which harvests tubers for consumption within four months after planting. The variety, whose vines have been distributed by Harvest Plus to selected farmers in Mpigi and Rakai districts, has been warmly received.
Dr Nkalubo is responsible for breeding high-iron beans while Dr Kasozi produced the orange maize (rich in vitamin A). Both the bean and maize varieties have come in handy for as many 200,000 households in districts where indigenous crop breeds failed due to disease and long drought spells.
The government has partnered with the US-based Harvest Plus, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) to promote and avail clean planting material of the aforesaid resistant breeds to farmers. The US and UK development agencies; USAID and DFID respectively, support the campaign as donor partners.
Harvest Plus chief executive officer Bev Postma, who attended the dinner at Imperial Royale hotel in Kampala last weekend, was hugely impressed by the three scientists’ work at NaCRRI.
It is against such background that Postma has invited the three Ugandan scientists to speak for their breakthrough innovations at the fourth global biofortification conference due next year in India.
In recent years, scientists at the Namulonge-based NaCRRI have also had major breakthroughs in producing matooke (Mpologoma) and cassava varieties that defy the deadly wilt and mosaic diseases.
The new varieties are ready for harvest within twelve months, giving high and quick returns to farmers. Postma says promoting such varieties will not only boost the country’s food security but also avail nutritious components in vitamin A, iron and zinc that pregnant women and mothers need for proper health.
Harvest Plus has registered success in Rwanda, Zambia, DR Congo, Pakistan, India and the Caribbean through the same biofortification campaign.
However, government officials and other concerned stakeholders in Uganda have had to convince farmers to embrace such varieties in the face of an ongoing controversial debate on genetically-modified (GMOs) breeds. Anti-GMO campaigners and some parliamentarians have blocked the passing of the GMO bill, which was shelved last year.
mugalu@observer.ug