East-West Seed Group, one of the world’s largest vegetable seed
companies, has stepped up its presence in Cambodia by officially
launching a local branch and taking over distribution operations in the
Kingdom to better address local market conditions, a company
representative said yesterday.
Heng Rithea, country representative of East-West Seed (EWS) for
Cambodia, said the company’s business model was focused on serving the
needs of smallholder farmers, the vast majority of whom produce
vegetables on plots smaller than a hectare.
“Smallholder farmers can increase the yield and quality of their crops with improved seed varieties,” he said.
EWS began providing seeds to Cambodia in 2005 through a local
distributor. In 2009 the Thai-based company expanded to
knowledge-transfer activities in cooperation with the government and
German development agency GIZ, training farmers in Siem Riep on improved
techniques that result in higher productivity. This was followed by
other partnerships with the government and development organisations in
other parts of the country.
Rithea said a stronger local presence would help improve the
company’s understanding of the local market and allow it to develop new
seed varieties under local farming conditions to ensure suitability and
adaptability for Cambodian farmers.
“We breed for what the market wants,” he said. “We understand the
local needs and see what is happening in the market and [in people’s]
diets.”
He said innovation was crucial to raising the standards of the
agricultural industry, adding that EWS invests around 15 percent of its
turnover into research and development.
“This allows us to develop tropical vegetable seeds that help farmers grow better crops,” he said.
Rithea explained that Cambodia’s agricultural industry faces numerous
challenges, including a hot, humid climate subject to heavy rains and
extreme weather conditions.
“This kind of environment results in high pest and disease pressure,”
he said. “Farmers also lack access to technology, basic infrastructure
like farm-to-market roads, irrigation and post-harvest facilities and
lack of access to credit and finance.”
He said another challenge here was the amount of unregistered seeds
that flow into the country from different channels and which, while sold
at very competitive prices, are of dubious quality.
“Some farmers who used those seeds without any information or
warranty wasted lots of time, money and labour as the seeds did not
germinate or provided low yields,” he said.
Cambodian farmers are increasingly turning to specialised companies
to provide high-quality seeds for their crops, according to Khan Samban,
director of the Industrial Crops Department at the Ministry of
Agriculture, who said 21 registered seed companies now supply the local
market.
“All the registered seed companies are growing currently on the potential to increase the productivity of farmers,” he said.
Author: Cheng Sokhorng - PhnomPenhPost
