Seeds Supply in Bhutan: Limiting Factors

INTRODUCTION

Meeting farmers demand for best seeds of popular varieties at the right time or place during planting season is crucial for increasing production and achieving food security.  This is only possible when national seed program and private sector seed enterprises are complementing each others in a right regulatory and institutional arrangement. 

Seed relatively constitutes a smaller portion of overall investment of farmers for crop production.  Hence high quality seed is the most easily adopted technology by the farmers to enhance productivity and maximize return from all other inputs, including labor. 

In modern agriculture, seed is more than something that germinates and reproduce.  What farmers want is seed that guarantees higher productivity and greater economic return. 

High quality seeds carry genetic potential for higher crop yield.  They have higher level of tolerance to  stress conditions and insect pests, and resistance to diseases.  When seeds of low quality are made available to the farmers, the farmers do not see the advantage of buying new seeds.  This answers the question as why farmers want to use their own seeds.  This is a typical representation of underdeveloped agriculture where  the seed quality is low. 

 In the past when hybrid seeds were not there the policy of seed self-sufficiency was pursued.  The import of seeds was discouraged by levying 50% Custom Duty on import of seeds from third countries.  Seed import from India only was allowed and there was neither Custom Duty nor Sales Tax on seeds of Indian origin.  

However, since 1980s hybrid seed in cases of popular vegetables began to dominate the choice of the farmers.  The international seed companies began to dominate the supply of hybrid seeds particularly of vegetables, even in India. 

Farmers in Bhutan who grow vegetables like cabbage, cauliflower, or broccoli for selling in the market for earning money use hybrid seeds imported from third countries.  They want best quality hybrid seeds because they want to maximize their earning from the limited land they have.  

The 50% Custom Duty on seeds imported from third country is making the hybrid seeds highly expensive.  Farmers having no choice have to buy the expensive hybrid seeds.  The time and situation have changed but not the policy.  This is indeed a very important issue that the new seed policy should consider removing the antiquated policy of levying 50% Custom Duty on import of hybrid seeds from third countries.

A conservative seed policy is effectively restricting the supply of high quality hybrid seeds by the private sector.  The policy reform should be guided by the goal of increasing productivity and production for achieving self-sufficiency and export of fresh vegetables.  The reform should call for a level playing field for the participation of private sector in seed business.   

The seed policy should recognize and exploit the strength of private seed enterprises on delivering best hybrid seeds on time.  It is on this strength the private seed enterprises thrive.

The private seed enterprises can do on-farm testing much more efficiently and  translate farmers’ perception into business opportunity much faster.

Indeed the weakness of national seed program is hidden in its strength for doing all on seed by itself.  Very crucial areas on which the national seed program should exert far more seriously have not received due attention. 

The maintenance breeding for producing high quality basic and foundation seeds of food crops and non-hybrid varieties of vegetables should receive special attention.  It should also produce the seeds of minor crops which have been neglected or forgotten.   The national seed program should focus on seeds of food crops and non-hybrid vegetable seeds which by nature strike commercial scale only with large scale operation due to which the private sector do not come forward.

Considering the changing climate a reality and the recurrence of disasters the national seed program should be considering national seed security more seriously.  

The country has embarked on the path of organic agriculture and it requires organic seeds.  It is high time that the seed policy should set direction for national seed program to start producing organic seeds grown in certified organic soil using inputs (fertilizers and pesticides) allowed for organic agriculture. 

With seed trade being globalized, it is no longer possible to pursue a seed policy isolation.  The trans-border movement of seed is necessary and it is inevitable.  It calls for harmonizing seed policy with that of other countries.

The seed policy at one hand must ensure protection of traditional varieties and land races and on the other hand it should facilitate import, exchange or share seeds.  It is so justified that no country in the world has all the plant genetic resources it needs.

The national traditional crop varieties and endemic land races must be protected and use them in developing modern varieties and exchange or share with others under the principle of reciprocity but outside the patent right regime.

The national seed policy should strengthen link between public sector national seed program and local private sector seed enterprise and the policy reform must come to a conclusion giving private sector an opportunity to participate in trading business on hybrid vegetables seeds.  

If hybrid seeds are to be subsidized the private sector too  should receive the subsidy grant.

The national seed program is civil service organization and it is executed by civil servants.  In no country the civil servants do the trading job of buying and selling hybrid seeds of international seed companies. 

With highest wisdom, the private sector should be allowed do the trading business on hybrid seeds of vegetables which are commercial in nature.

CONSTRAINTS

Unequal Level Playing Field 

In the present situation, 50% Custom Duty is levied to the seeds imported from third countries.  The national seed program imports hybrid seeds from third country and sells to the farmers.  But it also receives subsidy grant from the Government.  It sells the hybrid seeds at ex-country purchase price as it meets all its expenses including Custom Duty paid by it with the subsidy grant money.  The agriculture extension program purchases the hybrid seeds from national seed program and provides to farmers free of cost under various promotional and other support activities.  It leaves no room for private seed enterprises for doing seed business.

The national seed program enjoys three kinds of Government support: (i) subsidy grant given by the Government annually to national seed program, (ii) sales commission to sales agents paid by Dzongkhag Administration, and (iii) transport subsidy disbursed by Department of Agriculture.  These supports creates big disadvantage to local private seed enterprises.  

The local private seed enterprises have to add  50% Custom Duty levied on seed import and other operating cost and profit margin to the purchase cost of the seed. It creates a huge difference between the price of national seeds program and of private seed enterprise for the same seed from same source.  Hence private seed enterprises cannot do business in hybrid seeds of vegetables imported fro third countries.  

Buying and selling is a typical business which should be in the domain of private sector.  The national seed program being the Government institution should not be doing a trading job which private sector can handle more efficiently.

The policy reform should consider removing the 50% Custom Duty on imports of seeds from third countries.  The Custom Duty (import tax) levied on seeds is indeed paid by the farmers which in the present situation the Government is paying to the Government on behalf of the farmers.  

Subsidizing hybrid vegetables seed which by nature is a commercial product is not a good proposition.  In fact such subsidy should be provided for producing organic seeds and producing high quality seeds of food crops. 

In situation where the Government does all, there is little space for private sector participation.

The seed industry of a country is considered good only when the national seed program and private seed enterprises are operating harmoniously exploiting each others’ advantage. 

The seed policy should not only support national seed program in the public sector but also the local private seed enterprises and the community initiatives at local level. 

It is extremely important that there must be a well balanced level playing field for the realizing a win-win situation for both national seed program and private sector seed enterprises.

The private sector seed enterprises have the strength in supplying seeds of commercial in nature, and B2B engagement for accessing new seeds particularly from international seed companies. 
 
 Release of New Varieties

In Bhutan neither national research nor national seed program, or private seed companies have ability to breed new high yielding varieties, leave aside hybrids which are also tolerant to stress condition and resistant to pests and diseases.    Hence, accessing new varieties and hybrids from national seed program of other countries and international seed companies is inevitable. 

Bhutanese farmers have benefited with the introduced maize variety Suwan-1, a CYMMIT maize variety which has been released as Yangtsepa.  It carries genes of 36 land races of different countries.  Similarly the rice variety IR 64, an IRRI variety introduced into the country carries genes of land races of different countries. 

From technical point of view, it is necessary to cultivate wide range of varieties to have low level of pest occurrences and frequency of pest outbreak, and to have higher degree of stability against crop failure.

But the restrictive policy and release procedure have staggered the chances of having more varieties giving an array of choices to the farmers.  As a result we have only a limited number of hybrid varieties of commercial vegetable crops.

Making it difficult for introducing even the hybrids successfully grown in similar environment across the borders discourages private sector and slow down the process for reaching best seeds to the farmers. 

The national seed program can obtain improved varieties in the public domain of other countries, while private sector seed enterprises can effectively obtain improved varieties from international private seed companies.

The seed policy therefore should ease out import of samples of new hybrids for testing and release for which simple procedures and single window facility should be provided. 

Sample seeds import can be easily restricted by limiting the quantity of import.  For instance, if only 100 gram seeds for small seeded vegetables (e.g. cabbage) and 500 gram for large seeded vegetables (e.g Beans and peas) is allowed as samples, the sale of unreleased hybrids cannot take place.   In doing so, the amount of seed samples itself prohibits direct entry of non released varieties into the market.

Further the private seed enterprises could be allowed to carry out testing of new varieties and present the test result for getting them released.  Condition could be imposed on test methods and procedure for proposing new varieties for release.  This would certainly lessen the burden of national research or national seed program.

OTHER AREAS FOR CONSIDERATION 

 Access to Public Varieties

The seed policy should have provision to allow private seed companies to obtain foundation seeds from national seed program to produce and sale certified seeds at local level.

The maintenance breeding was rightly started under national seed program which should be its one of the primary mandates and it should be strengthened.     

When the foundation seeds are not having high genetic purity and quality of certified seed will be low.  Unless, the farmers see the advantage of buying fresh seeds from the national seed program they prefer to use their own seeds.  This is why the seed replacement rate in Bhutan is low which means the quality of seed being made available is of low quality.

The national seed program should strengthen its maintenance breeding work and share the job of producing certified seeds of OP varieties with the private seed enterprises.  
  
Access to Facilities and Services

When the size of local seed market is small and the international market is dominated by advanced hybrids, and highly competitive, the local private sector seed enterprises will not make high capital investment for having seed processing facility. 

The national seed program does have the seed processing facilities which are not used to its full capacity.

The national seed program should let local private seed enterprises to use facilities for seed drying, cleaning and grading, and packaging at cost basis.

The seed policy should justify the Government to support for having good seed processing, packaging and storage facility with the national seed program for its own use and as well as for letting local private seed enterprises to use the facility.

Professionalizing the Sales and Supplies

In the country supply and sales of  medicines and other pharmaceutical products are done done be trained medical professionals and license is granted to such person only who are considered eligible. 

In contrast, the seeds, fertilizers and Butachlor (herbicides) are retailed by everybody who have no clue about what is being sold or supplied.  This is an issue of recognizing the technical nature of agriculture. 

It is time now that issuance of new licenses for selling of agricultural inputs are issued to person with agricultural background or necessarily require employing persons with agricultural background.  It is necessary to provide better services and technical advice to the farmers along with the inputs.

To the existing sellers it is important that basic training is regularly provided and also require them to employ persons having training in agriculture if necessary. 

Movement of Seeds beyond Border

The movement of seed beyond border is hindered by a lack of harmonized seed laws, policies, rules and institutional arrangements.

Bhutan signed the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in 1992.  Under CBD, the instrument of Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) was put in place for conserving, using and benefit sharing from the use of genetic resources.

To ease ABS, Bonn Guidelines was adopted in 1999.  Further the Nagoya Protocol came into effect in 2014.   Besides the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA) is effective since 2004. 

The two legal tools of ABS are PIC (Prior Informed Consent) and MAT (Mutually Agreed Term). 

Within the framework of ABS, initiative for ‘Seeds without Borders’, has been undertaken for accessing seeds and genetic materials from cooperating countries.  

Through these legal channels we can access genetic materials of our interest.  But we need both institutional and legal capacity in the country.  

Hence not only for benefiting from others but also for safeguarding our own genetic resources, the seed policy should support for building institutional and legal capacity in the country.

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI)

The seed policy should create space for (FDI) involving local investors to ensure continuity of the commercial relationships through joint venture. 

The foreign investors coming forward for FDI, as seen in all other sectors, ties up with private sector.  The 100% owned FDI are not in the interest of private sector development of the country. 

Hence letting local private seed companies to gain strength, capacity building and competence remain a key factor for attracting FDI in seed sector. 

24^th June 2019