For sustainable production of seeds, 20 farmers from six eastern districts attended three-day long training on vegetable seed production in Monggar recently. It is to make vegetable seeds easily available in the eastern region and also encourage farmers to earn higher returns.
A 34 year-old Sherab Dema from Trashigang is one of the farmers who attended the training. After attending similar kind of training in Wengkhar in 2010, she started a nursery back home to supply vegetable seeds. And it was profitable.
“It has been almost six years since I started doing business. After attending the training out here in 2010, I earned one hundred and thirty nine thousand ngultrum by producing and selling vegetable seeds from the nursery,” said Sherab.
Like her, some other farmers found the training useful since it enhanced their knowledge in vegetable seed production.
“We used to grow seeds in greenhouse but it is different from what we learnt here. We learnt that there is less chance of plants dying if we wrap it in plastic while cultivating in greenhouse,” said one of the farmers, Ugyen Tenzin.
Eight farmers from the present batch attended similar training in 2010 which was supported by JICA.
“It’s mainly to exchange their experience, where the previously seed growers advise and act as a resource person in this training to share their skills and knowledge regarding seed production,” said an official from the Agriculture Research and Development Centre, Wengkhar, Sangay Jamtsho.
To make marketing of seeds easy, the seed growers will also be linked to National Seed Centre gradually.
