Lichinga, a remote and poor province in Mozambique, has the cool weather conditions necessary for multiplying potato seed. The aeroponics facility is an important part of CIP’s active involvement with its partners from the Mozambique Agrarian Research Institute to improve quality seed production. Aeroponics is a technique in which the plants are grown in the air, without the use of soil. It can produce harvests with higher yields (5 to 10 times higher) than with conventional soil planting and in shorter amounts of time. CIP is also involved in a parallel effort in Mozambique to develop improved potato cultivars that can increase yields in local conditions.
“Both researchers and government ministers are hopeful that with improved potato technologies, we can provide healthy seed for the region’s resource poor farmers and see reductions in seed imports, which currently cost Mozambique US$2 million each year,” explains CIP’s Victor Otazu, who welcomed the officials along with his colleague Dieudonné Harahagazwe.