Leveraging indigenous sorghum varieties better adapted to climate change
By Milliam.Murigi, February 15, 2022The adverse effects climate change is having on farming systems in Africa cannot be overstated. Now, more than ever before, drastic sustainable solutions need to be arrived at to stave perennial hunger from becoming a disaster.
In many areas, crop varieties and species currently grown by farmers cannot tolerate these stresses, with resultant losses in productivity, and potentially negative consequences food security.
“Farmers need to supplement current crop varieties with better-adapted ones to cope with the rapidly evolving climate conditions,” says Dr Desterio Ondieki Nyamongo, Director, Genetic Resources Research Institute (GeRRI), a semi-autonomous institute under the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organisation (Kalro) that is mandated to conserve agrobiodiversity.
He says the introduction of modern improved varieties has led to the loss of adapted traditional varieties that farmers have depended on for a long time. In addition, climate change has also negatively impacted agro-biodiversity, leading to further loss of important indigenous crops and varieties.
With this background and funding from the Global Crop Diversity Trust, GeRRI has moved in to address this challenge by introducing a new project dubbed Seeds for Resilience Project, whose main objective is to support the National Gene Bank of Kenya (GBK) to ensure that the conserved crop diversity is accessible and of benefit to farmers, breeders and researchers.
Preferred varieties
“We organised a farmer participatory sorghum variety selection event at Kalro and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT) research fields in Kibos, Kisumu County, where farmers and researchers worked together to select crop accessions best suited to their needs and environments,” says Dr Nyamongo.
During the event, which was conducted in collaboration with Rongo University, farmers were expected to select their preferred varieties from a total of planted 201 samples, which are part of the approximately 6,000 sorghum samples conserved at GeRRI. The objective of the event was to expose farmers to diverse genotypes available at GeRRI and to help identify and promote farmer-preferred sorghum varieties.
“Genetic diversity remains extremely important, not only to individual farmers and farming communities but also to scientists and breeding institutions. Availability of the said diversity enables farmers to grow crops under a range of varying conditions and adverse environments. It further allows them to better manage uncertainties, spread their risks of production, and sustain livelihoods particularly in marginal production areas,” says Dr Nyamongo.
Dr Peterson Wambugu, Senior Scientist at GeRRI said the project will enhance the capacity of farmers to fight climate change, since they will be supported to access productive, genetically diverse and adapted varieties. “GeRRI maintains a huge genetic diversity of crops that play an important role in food and nutritional security, as well as enhancing climate resilience,” he added.
Farmer involvement
He said the event stimulated local interest in indigenous varieties and enhanced farmers’ awareness of sorghum varieties conserved by GeRRI from various countries around the world. “Based on our interactions with farmers, it is clear that they were happy with a variety of the genotypes that they observed. Farmers selected genotypes that were early maturing and high yielding,” he says, adding, “Panicle colour was another farmer selection criteria, with the majority preferring the red sorghum. Similarly, the majority of the farmers preferred short to medium stature sorghum plants. The farmers involved in this exercise said red sorghum is less prone to bird attack and damage.”
Farmers managed to select about 15 promising genotypes/ecotypes possessing preferred traits and attributes. Out of these, were important red sorghum traditional varieties, which according to the farmers, had already been lost from their farming systems. Identification of these varieties provides an opportunity for their reintroduction back to farmers. William Buluma, the Coordinator of the Sustainable Income Generating Investment (SINGI), a community-based organisation based in Busia County says the reintroduction of these varieties will be a game-changer as far as food security in the county is concerned. The reason being these traditional varieties are more adapted, highly nutritious and provide more satiety than other varieties.
Plant breeders
Mary Strange, one of the farmers present during the selection event, commended the initiative saying that involving farmers in plant breeding is the way to go because when farmers are exposed to different varieties, they can choose the best varieties that are suitable for their ecological zones.
She says plant breeders should also do the same rather than coming up with new varieties on their own without involving farmers.
Mary says engaging farmers during selection will always ensure that varieties released thereafter meet farmers’ expectations in the context of their marketability, adequate yield potential and stability over seasons.
“I came here with high expectations. I was looking forward to seeing different sorghum varieties since I am used to only one variety. Learning that there are about 201 sorghum varieties that a farmer can choose from has been an eye-opener.
I have identified five accessions that might be fit to our ecological zone and I hope to plant these varieties come next season,” she says.