In Tanzania’s Lake Zone, sweetpotato is a critical food security crop as it supplements maize and cassava and serves as a stand by when other staples fail due to drought and disease. The orange-fleshed varieties (OFSP) offer high beta-carotene levels to combat vitamin A deficiency. It’s cropping cycle is short …

Sweetpotato (SP) is a vegetatively propagated crop grown with short cropping cycle. Each cropping cycle starts by planting cuttings. Most crops propagated vegetatively include SP accumulate diseases, such as viruses, through each successive generation. This can lead to significant declines in yield. Throughout SSA, most farmers source their planting material …

Genetically modified (GM) crops contain traits that have been introduced by the tools of modern biotechnology. Their novelty has prompted comprehensive assessment of their human and environmental safety. With conventional breeding, thousands of genes are shuffled and recombined to obtain a desired trait. In comparison, modern biotechnology adds as little …

Weevil is a major threat to sweetpotato, which plays a vital role in food security and income generation for both the urban and rural poor in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Weevils can devastate sweetpotato production, and even cause total crop loss. Weevil resistant varieties are the most sustainable solution to this …

Weevils can destroy 60%-100% of sweetpotato (SP) crops during periods of pronounced drought. As SP is at times the only food available, this can be quite devastating. The impact of weevils can affect not only food security, but also sweetpotato production, marketability, and sustainability, especially in areas experiencing longer dry …

National sweetpotato breeding programs are time consuming and delay to produce new variety. Frequently those new varieties do not suit the various geographic areas and the preferences of diverse farmers and consumers within a country. Most countries have no real breeding program and rely on testing materials developed elsewhere, which …

Sweetpotato Action for Security and Health in Africa (SASHA) is an initiative designed to improve the food security and livelihoods of poor families in Sub-Saharan Africa by exploiting the untapped potential of sweetpotato. It will develop the essential capacities, products, and methods to reposition sweetpotato in food economies of Sub-Saharan …