Context
The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) recently examined community seed banks (CSBs) across India and raised issues over declining intergenerational switch of traditional seed conservation understanding.
Importance of Traditional Seed Conservation
- Genetic Diversity: These seeds have a broad genetic base, making crops evidently resilient to pests and sicknesses.
- Climate Resilience: With erratic climate turning into the norm—starting from cloudbursts to droughts—traditional seeds offer insurance. In combined cropping systems, despite the fact that a few varieties fail, others survive and yield well.
- Sustainability: Open-pollinated and reusable, those seeds thrive under natural farming techniques, unlike industrial hybrid seeds that demand chemical inputs and need to be sold every season.
Community Seed Banks (CSBs)
- CSBs allow farmers to borrow conventional seeds and return double the amount post-harvest. This guarantees seed security, in particular in ecologically fragile or tribal regions.
- Yet, India lacks a concrete policy framework to manipulate CSBs. The Seed Bill 2019 stays pending, and has no formal form but exists to integrate farmer-led seed systems into the national agricultural approach.
Challenges in Seed Conservation
- Declining Youth Engagement: Young farmers more and more opt for hybrid or genetically changed (GM) seeds, lured through perceptions of higher yield.
- Lack of Support for CSBs: Most community seed banks (CSBs) operate with minimal investment, largely run through NGOs or self-help groups.
- Erosion of Cultural Practices: Familial transmission of agricultural data has weakened over generations.
- Policy Gaps and Exploitation of Farmers’ Rights: Despite legal guidelines just like the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights Act (PPVFRA), documentation of “common expertise” seed types remains poor.
Preservation Practices on the Ground
- Odisha’s Niyamgiri Foothills: Farmers sow several millets, greens, and herbs like tulsi and marigold, ensuring ecological stability.
- Barah Anaj System, Uttarakhand: Revived by the Beej Bachao Andolan, it promotes the cultivation of 12 conventional crops collectively.
- Teeratha Village, Karnataka: Youth are concerned in Participatory Variety Selection (PVS) through the Sahaja Samrudha CSB community, testing and choosing the most appropriate millet varieties in “variety blocks”.
- Chizami, Nagaland: A women-led CSB not only conserves seeds but also imparts hands-on education to youth and school college students on conventional farming and storage.
- In many areas ladies play an imperative function in storing seeds in earthen pots or bamboo baskets with neem leaves, ensuring validity without chemicals.
- The Bharat Beej Swaraj Manch (BBSM), established in 2014, has revitalised seed-saving thru community-led fairs in Mumbai, Pune, Kolkata, and Hyderabad—highlighting seed security as a man’s movement.
Way Ahead
- Policy Integration and Legal Protection: Fast-track documentation of common knowledge varieties to prevent unjust privatisation.
- Incentivising Young Seed Savers: Offer awards, education, and financial guide to young people engaged in seed conservation.
- Promoting Decentralised Diversity: Encourage in-situ seed conservation in forests and farms.
- Cultural Revitalisation: Leverage festivals, folklore, and family traditions to connect youth with their agrarian history.
Conclusion
- Traditional seed conservation is not just about biodiversity, it is about ecological security, food security, and cultural continuity.
- With the proper mix of policy, public guide, and intergenerational collaboration, India’s seed saviours can help us build a greater resilient agricultural future.
Source: The DTE
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