BRAC Seed and Agro Enterprise

BRAC Seed and Agro Enterprise focuses on supplying quality agricultural inputs, appropriate production and post-harvest technologies to enhance production.

BRAC Seed and Agro Enterprise has three agricultural research and development centres in Gazipur, Bogra (Sherpur) and Dinajpur (Birol). The centres are conducting applied research on plant tissue culture, vegetables, rice and maize. It has a soil-testing laboratory with the capacity of testing around 3,000 soil samples per year. Our researchers focus on discovering new varieties that meet the need

s of both regional farmers and consumers. BRAC has developed five hybrid rice varieties, four hybrid maize varieties, 10 hybrid vegetable varieties and three open-pollinated vegetable varieties. It has registered 12 hybrid rice exotic varieties through government authorities. With 22 production centres and about 7,000 contract farmers around the country BRAC is the country’s largest producer of hybrid maize seed and second largest producer of potato seed. It has the largest market share for rice seed (hybrid and high-yielding varieties), maize seed, potato seed and vegetable seed. The seed and agro enterprise has established five seed processing centres with a processing capacity of 12,000 metric tons per year, along with 11 modern storage systems with the capacity of 4,400 metric tons. To ensure high quality seeds, the enterprise uses automatic polymer seed coating treatment (fungicide) and an automatic packaging system. Furthermore, it promotes environment-friendly farming by marketing micronutrients like zinc and boron in order to tackle the rising micronutrient deficiency in soil. BRAC’s seed and agro enterprise has built the value chain system of production and distribution through a wide network of 450 dealers and more than 4,500 sub-dealers around the country. BRAC Seed and Agro Enterprise is now marketing 26 hybrid varieties and 27 open pollinated varieties of vegetable seed, 13 hybrid varieties and 19 high-yield varieties of rice seed, 14 hybrid varieties of maize seed and 5 varieties potato seed. During the production season 2014-15, the enterprise has marketed 1,600 metric tons hybrid rice seed, 1,300 metric tons high-yielding varieties of rice seed, 590 metric tons hybrid maize seed, 125 metric tons vegetable seeds and 9,600 metric tons potato seeds. In the seed business, BRAC Seed and Agro Enterprise has 19% market share in hybrid rice, 23% in hybrid maize, 36% in potatoes (of organised seed supplied) and 8% in vegetables. In tandem, BRAC is also importing quality seeds regularly to increase the national production of high-yielding varieties invented across the globe. Besides the core seed business, the seed and agro enterprise is currently working with two projects, ‘agri-business for trade Competitiveness Project (ATC-P) Bangladesh’, which ensures the availability of quality vegetable seeds at hard-to-reach areas and ‘SUSTAIN’, which aims to ensure nutrition-enriched orange flesh sweet potato production and promotion on chars and areas with salty soil and water. Previously, BRAC Seed and Agro Enterprise worked on the USAID Horticulture Project to improve incomes, nutrition and health in Bangladesh through the cultivation of potato, sweet-potato and vegetables. The enterprise also collaborated with CIP, under FoodSTART, for a project funded by IFAD to ensure food security through roots and tuber crops. Another project was conducted in collaboration with Katalyst, under Swisscontact, which involved the promotion of maize cultivation through increasing awareness, access to information and quality inputs in the southern region of the country in order to allow farmers to generate income.