Food Festival promotes unique agribusiness ideas

It is early morning as the Monitor Seeds of Gold Farm Clinic team sets off to National Crop Resources Research Institute Namulonge to participate in the Utafiti (Research) Food Festival.

This is the first food festival of its kind organised by the National Agricultural Research Organisation (Naro) in collaboration with Nation Media Group where agricultural scientists across Naro research Institutes, including private partners, converged to showcase technologies developed to maintain food security in the country.

The major emphasis at festival which took place on December 30, 2021 at Marylouis Simkins Memorial Golf Course in Namulonge was about the newly released four rice varieties specifically developed for rain-fed lowlands as well 12 vegetable varieties.

Backbone

The NMG Senior Activation and Promotions Officer Joshua Esau Watwaluma explained that since agriculture is the backbone of Uganda’s economy, it is very crucial for NMG, as a media organisation, to sensitise the public about new upcoming technologies employed by agricultural scientists in breeding food crops for the uptake of the nation.

“The NMG team in Uganda has over the years partnered with Naro in sponsoring the Seeds of Gold Farm Clinic activities where scientists are invited to come and sensitise farmers about farm management practices for bumper harvests including knowledge on upcoming technologies. These include adoption of hybrid seed varieties that are capable of giving better yields, health management of crops and animals as well as management of the fishing sector and poultry. This time we are privileged to be part of the Utafiti Food Festival where scientists showcase crops which are more nutritious, more resilient to pests and diseases to feed Ugandans,” Watwaluma noted.

He noted that lately a section of the public do not trust the kind of food they purchase in the open market and it is timely that scientists at Naro engaged the public to taste food prepared from products bred in their various research institutes.

Food time

The Director NaCRRI Dr Godfrey Asea explained that Utafiti food tasting activity is to demonstrate that scientific research contributes to the day-to-day food we consume in our families.

He contends that Scientists at Naro are working hard because as they continue to implement breeding programmes to develop various varieties of crops, the most important issue to address is quality assurance. It is the reason why scientists address challenges of pest and disease resistance, higher yields and drought tolerance when developing the varieties.

The scientists have gone further to develop food crops that contain nutrients such as Zinc, Iron and Vitamin A, among others, to address challenges of anaemia and malnutrition in pregnant mothers and children.

The Naro Deputy Director General Agricultural Technologies Dr Sadik Kasim noted that his organisation is rethinking and diversifying promotional strategies for increased production and utilisation through organising annual food festivals meant to increase awareness amongst farmers and the public about the myths around research derived agricultural technology promotions.

The scientists at NaCRRI prepared various foods from products such as Orange fleshed maize flour, orange fleshed sweet potato rich in Vitamin A and Beta Carotine and bread processed from Cassava and sweet potatoes. 

Others include; pre-cooked beans prepared from bean varieties rich in Iron and Zinc, coffee, pumpkin, tomatoes and value added coffee and cocoa flavoured lotions as well as coffee flavoured yoghurt, among others.

New crop varieties

During the event, Naro scientists unveiled 15 rice varieties for lowland areas.

Dr Samson Ojok, who works with the rice breeding programme at NaCRRI explains that the newly released varieties can be grown in upland and irrigated lowlands.

These include the Nerica series Nerica 1 – 10 and Namche 1-6 all grown upland. The irrigated lowland varieties are Wita9, Komboka, Agoro and Okile varieties. The yield rate of these varieties under good management are 2-3 tonnes per hectare. 

Dr Ojok explains that the newly released varieties include Naro Rice 1 conating straw coloured grains and is similar to supper rice and it mature in 95 days. The yield rate is 5, 7080kg per hectare.

Naro Rice 2 matures in 120 days and has slender grains similar to Basmat rice variety imported from Pakistan with yield rate of 5,980 kg per hectare.

Naro Rice 3 mature in 115 days and it has heavy grains bigger than the preferred Supper rice and it yields 4,760 kg per hectare.

Naro Rice 4 which matures in 130 days and it yields 6,520 kg per hectare with heavy and bigger grains

All these varieties are aromatic, they are bred for purposes of substituting imported rice into the country and they are tolerant to rice blast virus disease, rice blight and bacterial leaf streak.

These varieties are bred from wild varieties obtained from West Africa and the International Rice Research Institute in Philippines. The wild varieties are Onrya bouthi, Onrza glaberrima both form West Africa and Oryza longistaminata from Phillipines

They were crossed to Uganda’s indigenous wild rice variety Oryza Sativa through cross pollination to come up with the new varieties.

Best practices

According Dr Ojok, the best farming practices must be observed for optimum yields.

Planting

There are three methods of planting including direct seed planting which comprises broadcasting where farmers sow seed using hands and metallic drilling where a line is drilled using metallic fork measuring 30cm by 15cm. Seed is dropped into the drilled lines and covered.

The third method is the spot planting mainly practiced along mountain slopes where ploughing is difficult. Farmers use a metallic hook to make a hole of 30cm by 12.5cm and in each hole seven seeds are dropped and covered with soil.

Weeding

It takes a week for the seeds to germinate and after three weeks from germination farmers are advised to weed their farms.

This is the time to apply the first round of fertiliser namely UREA and Diammonium phosphate (DAP). This can be done before weeding and after 60 days from germination when the plants are flowering

Pests and diseases

The most common diseases are Rice Yellow Mortal virus, Rice blast, bacterial leaf blight and bacterial leaf streak virus. Farmers are advised to purchase clean seed from seed companies to avoid disease infection. The common pests are African gall midge, rice stem borer, stalked eyed fly and birds all are capable of destroying the leaves and stem to cause 100% damage.

Harvesting

Farmers are advised to harvest their rice when 80 per cent of the farm is looking brown. Any slight delay will enable the seeds to shutter and less rice will be harvested, therefore timely harvesting is recommended. It is advisable to thresh using small machines to avoid breakages. Drying should be done in three to four days on raised racks.

Newly vegetable released varieties

Dr Africano Kangire in charge of vegetable, oil and fruit programme at NaCRRI explained that the vegetable breeding programme targets highly productive, nutritious and climate resilient varieties to guarantee nutrition food security for the people of Uganda

His team released 12 varieties of vegetables which include pinktop and taten tomato varieties which can be harvested for a period of one year. Others are eggplant namely Miggeuni and Heukmi, Sukuma Wiki/ kale varieties namely Matjang and Je Guijok, Cucumber varieties Gangryuk-samcheok and Shinbinakhap.

Carbbage varieties which include Onnuri, Hogirl, Noranja and Bulam3ho 1. The initial seed for these vegetables are from China and South Korea, they are high yielding under good management conditions and farmers engagement in growing them usually do on as a commercial initiative targeting foreign nationals who like to consume them.

The vegetable varieties are resistant to pests such as black rot, whitefly cabbage butterfly and diseases namely fusarium crown rot, bacterial wilt and cucumber mosaic virus.

In case of any disease and pest attacks farmers are expected to apply recommended pesticides.

The vegetable varieties grow in a period of three months and they can be a source of quick income earning initiative for farmers.