Building an economically sustainable, integrated cassava seed system (BASICS) is a bold attempt to transform the way improved seed can be made available to smallholder farmers in developing nations, especially for the vegetatively propagated crops, where private sector does not see a business proposition. Social enterprise is the way to go.

1. Hemant Nitturkar
Project Director
BASICS – Project overview and status
23July2017
IITA,IBADAN
Dr Barbara Wells, DG, CIP
Welcome to Nigeria

2. WELCOME TO NIGERIA

3. 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

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

5. How well is cassava industry
doing in Nigeria?

6. 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!

7. Five components of BASICS

8. Locations of project activities
Broad regions of
project activity

9. KEY ACHIEVEMENTS SO FAR
SAH – RAPID MULTIPLICATION TECHNOLOGY
Set up at IITA, NRCRI and Shao Farm

10. 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

11. 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

12. 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

13. 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

14. 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