NAIROBI, April 14 — Kenya and the International Potato Center (CIP) signed a licensing agreement on Friday to transfer a biotech potato resistant to late blight. Eliud Kireger, director-general of Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO), said that the agreement is a significant achievement in developing and delivering impactful and science-driven solutions that directly address the challenges faced by the farmers. “Late blight, a devastating disease, is responsible for up to 70 percent yield losses in potatoes, hence threatening food security and farmers’ livelihoods in Kenya,” Kireger said during the signing ceremony on the sidelines of the ongoing Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) Science Week in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. He said that traditional control methods, such as chemical fungicides, are costly, environmentally taxing, and often inaccessible to smallholder farmers and have failed to save farmers from making losses.
The agreement is a landmark moment in agricultural biotechnology and the first of its kind that involves the transfer of a biotech potato resistant to the disease, Kireger added. Eric Magembe, a biotechnologist at CIP, said that by leveraging advanced research, the biotech late blight-resistant potato significantly reduces the need for chemical inputs, enhances productivity, and improves farmers’ resilience to climate-induced agricultural challenges. Given that late blight affects between 25 and 80 percent of potato farms, Magembe noted that with the adoption of the new biotechnology, farmers will save 25 percent of waste and increase their direct livelihood incomes by 34 percent. According to Moses Nyongesa, center director of KALRO’s research station at the Tigoni potato center, farmers in Kenya lost 300,000 metric tons of potatoes, equivalent to 50 million U.S. dollars, to late blight disease. He said that the agreement is a millstone partnership for Kenyan farmers who have been making huge losses after spending lots of money on their farms.
Xinhua proud partner of the African Youth Newspaper
