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Role of organisations/individuals in quality fodder seed production and
marketing
1. National Dairy Development Board
: Supports production agencies by organising supply
of breeder seeds of improved varieties from the Union Ministry of Agriculture/Indian Council
of Agricultural Research, arranging for funds to create the necessary infrastructure and in
training manpower. It also assists production agencies to market surplus certified/truthfully
labelled seeds.
2. Production agencies
: They are organisations that produce and market quality fodder
seeds on a financially self-sustaining basis e.g. state dairy federations, milk unions and
NDDB managed farms viz., Animal Breeding Centre, Salon and Sabarmati Ashram Gaushala.
They carry out the following activities:
• Collect advance data from milk producers regarding their requirement for fodder seeds
for a five-year span.
• Ascertain annual requirement of breeder/foundation seed on the basis of the above data
and send indent for breeder seed to NDDB three years in advance.
• Arrange for procurement of breeder and foundation seeds and organise their
further multiplication – breeder seed into foundation seed and foundation seed into
certified/truthfully labelled seed – through registered seeds growers under a buy-back
arrangement.
• Provide technical guidance to seed growers to produce quality seed.
• Own and manage seed storage godown, office-cum-seed testing laboratory and seed
processing area – containing equipment such as seed-cleaner-cum-grader, specific gravity
separator, seed treater, machines for weighing and packing and other miscellaneous
facilities.
• Organise field inspection and procurement of raw seed.
• Undertake seed processing, grading, treating, packing, weighing, labelling, certification
and storage.
• Supervise and approve the production of truthfully labelled seed.
• Market certified/truthfully labelled seed to milk producers at a reasonable price.
3. Seed growers:
They are farmers and organised farms – having adequate irrigated land
– who are registered with seed production agencies and produce quality seeds under a
buy-back arrangement.
4. State seed certification agencies
: They are autonomous bodies of state governments
set up in 21 states to monitor and approve the quality of foundation and certified seeds at
the request of production agency. In other states, this responsibility is with state agriculture
departments.
Quality control
The quality control measures taken up by state seed certification agencies/production agencies
include field inspections and laboratory tests.
Field inspections are carried out at different stages of the seed crop to ensure genetic
purity and maintain the minimum standards for isolation distance, off-type plants/ear-heads,
other inseparable crop plants, objectionable weed plants and plants affected by seed-borne
diseases.
The processed/graded seeds are tested in any of the approved seed testing laboratories
of state governments to maintain the seed standards for physical purity, other crop seeds
and other distinguishable varieties, weed seeds, objectionable weed seeds, germination and
moisture.