Dear Editor,
I am dissatisfied with the labelling of seed paddy being sold to farmers by the GRDB Burma Rice Research Station. The seeds do not have the requisite label with the necessary information on the bag. The bags have some things written on them with a marker. Anyone can write anything on the bags once they have a marker, and dupe the farmers.
This has been happening for some time now. The allegation is that the Burma Rice Research Station chooses to bypass this step in the processing and packaging of seed paddy, and as a consequence low quality seed paddy and paddy that does not fully meet the required standards is included.
Farmers who purchased paddy from the Burma Rice Research Station in the last crop can absolutely corroborate the statement about the quality of paddy received.
The time has come for the GRDB Board and the Minister of Agriculture to take steps to ensure that the seed paddy sold to farmers meets quality standards before being sold, and that seed labels are stitched within the lid of the bags giving the essential information of year and season grown, class of seed, variety, weight, % purity, % other crop seeds, % inert matter, % weed seeds, origin, % germination, date tested, etc, so that farmers can know what they are paying for is what they are getting in the bag, and not buying ‘pig in a bag’ as in the last few crops.
The seed quality standard protocol that determines the labelling of seeds is one that is known and used by seed production agencies in other part of the globe and should be adopted here in Guyana.
Yours faithfully,
Terry Ross
