Varsity students asked to churn out more improved seed varieties

SOUTHERN PROVINCE HUYE — Researchers at the National Agricultural Research Institute (ISAR) have asked students to promote the use of improved seed varieties and other inventions they make, among farmers countrywide. The researchers made the appeal last week while addressing 20 students drawn from four institutions of higher learning in the country, who were on a study tour at the research centre. At the ISAR headquarters in Rubona, Huye District, researchers briefed students on the mechanisms used to produce manure, multiply plantlets using the tissue culture technology, and make nutritious food from agricultural produce available in the country. Unlike ordinary seeds, the improved crop varieties are known to thrive in hard conditions and produce high yields.These varieties need to be adopted by private individuals in order to reach every one in the country, according to the Institute’s researchers. “We want to invest in biotechnology but it is up to you to take up the products,” the Director General of ISAR, Dr. Mark Cyubahiro, told the students after a guided tour of different laboratories. Cyubahiro urged them to work in teams to develop business plans and start earning money by transferring the Institute’s varieties to farmers. “What has killed African business is that people think individually,” he told the students. A newly built biotechnology laboratory at the centre has started multiplying coffee plantlets. “You need to make a company with a board and clear regulations to get plenty of money.” The students many of whom are in their last years of their courses were drawn from the National University of Rwanda (NUR), Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), School of Finance and Banking (SFB), and Umutara Polytechnic. The tour was facilitated by NUR based Students’ Association for Graduates Integration into Private Sector (SAGIPS) and the Rwanda Private Sector Federation (RPSF) aimed at encouraging students to engage in business and create their own jobs. “We want people who are job creators but not job seekers,” says Antoine Manzi Rutayisire of PSF.Manzi said that every five students among the twenty visiting students would come up with a project about using the technologies to support agricultural development that will be funded through partners. Students and university graduates are well placed young entrepreneurs capable of accelerating the country’s growth, according to SAGIPS officials. The officials argue that agriculture is the field to start with since many Rwandans are farmers. “Developing agriculture is developing the country’s economy at large,” says Jackson Rugambwa who leads the association. “If you invest in agriculture you are creating incomes for the poor people.” In their remarks the students resolved to design projects and start transferring the varieties made by ISAR to ordinary farmers. Clarisse Umutesi, one of them, was particularly impressed by seeds multiplication technology and the post-harvest unit of the institute. A fourth-year food science student at KIST, she said she would adopt the use of local produce to make food products like bread, biscuits, and cakes. “This trip has motivated me to be an entrepreneur,” she said. “There are feasible technologies here and I am planning to adopt one of them.” Ends