Nigeria has become the first African state to commercialize GMOs, which isn’t a problem in itself; however, hybrid seeds, certified seeds, counterfeit certified seeds, and GMO’s are often confused. All are high-yielding, but only GMO’s and certified seeds yield after replanting. The use of hybrid and counterfeit seeds is where the fear of agriculture colonization begins: with only one yield, farmers must buy new seeds every year from foreign companies selling at high prices. Ideally, the government will implement an educational campaign to explain the difference between all types of seeds. Also a threat to food security is the violence occurring across the country, leaving fields without their farmers, and no harvests. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many African countries are trying to develop by taking control of their own resources, however this will be hard for Nigeria if their farmers have to rely on buying seed every year from foreign companies. True food security is not going to be achieved by dependency, but self-sufficiency. If the current trend continues, farmers will not make enough revenue to improve cultivation and Nigeria will not develop. GMO’s that reduce the need for pesticides and resist drought can be a great asset to a blossoming economy, but they will be useless without education. I believe the most important factors of development are food security (to build a foundation) and education to grow the society. If the Nigerian public becomes educated on seed types, the society can gain control of its own resources and prosper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The actors in this debate are the Nigerian government, farmers, and seed-selling companies. The Nigerian government has provided some seeds to farmers around the state, but it could also commit to educating the public to avoid confusion on which seeds will produce multiple yields and crack down on counterfeit seed production. Farmers have very little power or choice. Besides experimenting with different seed types to discover which ones will replant, without the government’s help, the only real solution is to return to traditional practices, while making sure their soil stays healthy by rotating crops. Seed-selling companies will most likely continue to try and control prices and distribution of seeds, but ideally, they would stop the production of hybrid seeds and institute seed banks of GMO or certified seeds. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A connection to class can be made in that the root of the seed issues come from the actors of the Nigerian government and MNC seed-sellers, as well as global challenges like violence and underdevelopment caused by colonization. The concept of sovereignty is also prevalent. Nigeria may have state sovereignty, but Nigerians are increasingly worried about their resource and production sovereignty with their people depending on foreign companies for their livelihood. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Nigeria has become the first African state to commercialize GMOs, which isn’t a problem in itself; however, hybrid seeds, certified seeds, counterfeit certified seeds, and GMO’s are often confused. All are high-yielding, but only GMO’s and certified seeds yield after replanting. The use of hybrid and counterfeit seeds is where the fear of agriculture colonization begins: with only one yield,… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":374,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/374"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7240"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7248,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7240\/revisions\/7248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}