Seed Selection Techniques
Every planting season requires a budget forpurchase of inputs. With the rising cost of living farmers need to be innovative in ways that enable them to spend less, by maximizing the resources within their reach. One of these practices is is practicing on-farm seedselection, saving, and sharing. Farmers have embraced seed saving throughon-farm seed banks, and also community-owned/farmer-group-owned seed banks.Seed sharing can be through selling to other farmers or exchanging seeds with farmers. Farmers are trained on the seed selection process to ensure that they have quality seeds for planting.
Edward Mwikya Mating’i is a maize farmerbased at Uamani Village, Kangundo North ward in Machakos County. He has aone-acre farm on which he grows maize. He uses 16 kilograms of maize seeds (Kenya Seeds DH04) per season for the farm, and a kilogram of the seeds costsKsh 500. He is a member of Kamatu Hass Avocado Farmers-Ndunduni, who were trained by Biovision Africa Trust on seed selection, saving, and sharing. Edward decided to select maize seeds in the April 2025 rainy season.
In the maize farm, the crops that showed vigorous growth and tasseled early were selected. Colored tags were placed onthe stems of the maize crops for easy identification. The selected plants were harvested earlier than the other maize crops, dried, shelled, and winnowed.Storage was done in air-tight storage bags. It can also be done in storagecontainers and kept airtight. Edward harvested 1.5 bags of maize to use asseed.
“I did not purchase seeds to plant for theOctober rains; I used the ones I had saved. This cut the production cost in the farm”, he says. He also sold the seeds to members of the Kamatu Hass AvocadoFarmers – Ndunduni at Ksh 200 per kilogram. 10 farmers purchased the maize seeds, with quantities ranging from 1 to 5 kilograms.
“After selling the seeds to other farmersand planting, I have half a bag (45 kilograms) in storage. This will be used in the April rains next year. The seed selection process will also continue in the October rainy season. I do not plan on purchasing seeds from Agrovet. I will be using what I have selected and stored, and also purchase from other farmers whohave the traditional varieties”, Edward says in a very joyful voice.
Other farmers can adopt seed selection and saving methods for various crops, such as maize, beans, cowpeas, pigeon peas,and vegetables. For crops such as cassava and sweet potatoes, vines and cuttings can be selected and grown near a water source for multiplication, andlater planted after the onset of rains.
Seed selection and saving help preserve ourtraditional varieties and cut production costs on the farm. Through this,farmers will achieve food security.
