Abstract
Mapping Out Market Drivers of Improved Variety Seed Use: The Case of Sorghum in Tanzania
Highlights
Africa has a mean yield of 0.8 t/ha from the cultivated area of 24 million hectares with 20 million tons per year (FAOSTAT, 2015) that makes sorghum the second most important cereal grain in Africa after maize (Msongaleli et al, 2017)
When farmers produce sorghum grain based on market demand, it guarantees farmer's better grain price of their grain and drives farmers to use improved variety seeds, where taste and preference and price difference between grain and seeds have positive relationship with the use of improved variety seeds
It's advantageous for farmers to use improved varieties even under low input, compared to landraces, it assures farmers and grain off-takers quality grain and meet market demand
Summary
Sorghum is among the major staple food crops in the world, and it is mostly grown in semi-arid regions. The crop is used as human food and animal feed for forage and fodder, alcoholic beverages, and biofuels (Prasad and Staggenborg, 2011: Orr et al, 2020). It is the world's fifth important cereal crop in production after wheat, rice, maize, and barley (FAOSTAT, 2019). In Tanzania, sorghum is the third most widely grown cereal after maize and rice with a total of 834,284 ha which was planted with a total production of 500,000 tons (FAOSTAT, 2018), whereas the average acreage at national level per household was 0.67 ha in 2017 (Tshibaka, 1989)
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