Ethiopia: Seeding Ethiopia's Future Food Security 

Datta Dudettu and his seven children know what is like to go hungry. They live in Woliyta, a drought-prone area in southern Ethiopia that has experienced chronic food shortages. But hopefully, thanks to the successful use of hybrid seed, that is now firmly in the past.

"It was common to experience chronic food shortages due to drought or crop disease. My children were even too weak to go to school," Datta told IPS.
Datta and a number of other farmers in this Horn of Africa nation are experiencing improving food and livelihood security since the introduction of hybrid seed here.
In 2013 hybrid seed trials became long-term strategies to reduce hunger for major agricultural organisations here including NGO Self Help Africa and the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO).
"Improved seed varieties are produced by cross-breeding seeds from open pollinated varieties [self-producing] to obtain the best traits to create a high-yielding seed; whereas Genetically Modified seeds require the introduction of an organism's genes into a plant's genome to achieve desired traits," John Moffett, director of policy at Self Help Africa, told IPS.
Improved hybrid seeds deliver benefits to smallholder farmers without the dangers that come with GM, said Moffett. "We are concerned that the introduction of GM crops could have an impact on the genetic integrity of open pollinated varieties with negative impacts on farmers reliant on saved seed," he said.
Ethiopia currently prohibits the use of GM crops.
"The old seeds gave us a small crop. But the new seeds consistently provide us with a much better harvest every year ... Since our increased yield they have more energy to attend and get an education," said Datta who produces tuber crops.
In 2010, the FAO initially gave him 100 kgs of improved taro seeds from which he was able to harvest 800 kgs.
Three out of every four Ethiopians are engaged in agriculture, mainly in subsistence and rain-fed farming. Despite this, more than 31 million out of a total population of 91 million do not have adequate nutritious food in their diet according to the FAO.

Ethiopia