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Native Seeds Sustain Brazil's Semi-Arid Northeast

Osava, Mario
http://www.ipsnews.net/2017/01/native-seeds-sustain-brazils-semi-arid-northeast/

Publisher:  Inter Press Service (IPS)
Date Written:  06/01/2017
Year Published:  2017  
Resource Type:  Article

More than a thousand homes that serve as "seed banks", and 20,000 participating families, make up the network organised by ASA to preserve the genetic heritage and diversity of crops adapted to the climate and semi-arid soil in Brazil’s Northeast.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

Saving seeds is an age-old peasant tradition, which was neglected during the "green revolution", a period of agricultural modernisation which started in the mid-20th century and involved "an offensive by companies that produced the so-called 'improved' seeds," which farmers became dependent on, said Antonio Gomes Barbosa, a sociologist who is coordinator of ASA’s Seed Programme.

The strategy, adopted in 2007, of disseminating technologies for harvesting rainwater for production, in search of food security, lead ASA to the awareness that small producers needed to always have seeds available, he told IPS.

A study carried out among 12,800 families found that "the semi-arid Northeast has the greatest variety of seeds of food and medicinal plant species in Brazil." Of the 56 million people who live in the Northeast, more than 23 million live in the semi-arid parts of the region, in this South American country of 208 million.
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