Orange potato to save lives |
A biofortified new strain of sweet potato is being piloted by Self Help Africa in Uganda, in a bid to combat health problems resulting from vitamin deficiency in the local population.
Farmers in Kayunga district are taking part in trial production of a beta-carotene enriched orange-fleshed sweet potato (OFSP) – a food crop with the potential to combat widespread
Vitamin A deficiency in the region.
One of just a few food crops that can provide high quantities of beta-carotene, which is converted to Vitamin A in the body, the orange-fleshed sweet potato was introduced by Self Help Africa for field testing to around 375 households in Kayunga last year.
Sweet potato is a common staple food in most Ugandan households, but the traditional white-fleshed variety of the tuber remains the more popular – for reasons of both availability and tradition, although it lacks the same nutritional value.
The orange-fleshed sweet potato piloted by Self Help Africa has been developed at the Ugandan National Crops Resources Research Institute, whose research director, Dr. Gorrettie Ssemakula, explained that NASPOT 8 plants were used because of the added fortification with beta-carotene.
Keelin Tobin, a UCC student who researched the project during a development internship with Self Help Africa, said the Kayunga field trials had answered many questions, but that a number of issues still needed to be addressed if the crop was to be adopted more widely by rural farmers.
“As things stand, the amount of Vitamin A content in the crop variety is not the primary concern to farmers - yields are,” she said. Villagers in Kyato who were involved with the trial told her that the survival of stored orange-fleshed sweet potato vines between one planting season and the next was one of the challenges that they faced...
“This was partly to do with the fact thatthere was a particularly dry season this year,”
she said.
Dr. Ssemakula of NaCRRI believes that the key to the sustainable production of the new crop will be the development of planting opportunities in wetland areas, and the establishment of a local commercial enterprise that can produce and sell the vines. But Keelin Tobin reckons that an effective information campaign will also need to be mounted if the orange variety of sweet potato is to be used.
“The health and nutritional benefits of eating a more enriched variety of sweet potato will only be seen by people in the longer term. Information leaflets, recipes and other education and training are needed, while the access that Self Help Africa has to local farmer radio can be effective ways of raising awareness", she says.
“Self Help Africa currently participates in programmes on Victoria FM local radio, providing instruction to farming communities on crop storage, plant disease and other topics, and this will also be a valuable medium to raise awareness of the issues surrounding the sweet potato.” |
