Seed supply is a headache for Kazakh farmers. In the new season, a deficit of half of the demand is expected: that is, with a demand of 2 million tons, farmers will be able to procure only 1 million. To eliminate an acute shortage of seeds, the government is implementing a number of measures. Deputy Prime Minister Serik Zhumangarin spoke about them, responding to a request from Mazhilis deputies.
“To increase the availability of seeds against the backdrop of a possible rise in the price of seed material, changes are being made to the subsidy procedure to increase the standards for subsidies for seeds (by an average of 30%),” the Deputy Prime Minister said.
At the same time, he noted that some of the seed crops were harvested before the onset of prolonged rainfall. According to the examination, 90% of the seeds harvested at the beginning of harvesting correspond to classes 1 and 2 of the sowing standard.
Another part of the seeds will be provided through insurance funds of seed material, including seeds of high reproductions of last year’s harvest, which are available from some producers and seed farms. Therefore, it is planned that one of the sources of replenishing the deficit of seed material will be interregional and intraregional exchange.
The formation of the seed fund is currently being carried out by the Food Corporation. For this purpose, separate storage of the 2022 and 2023 grain harvests is now being ensured at authorized elevators.
“As part of this work, a survey of the available volumes of grain is being carried out to determine the possibility of its use as seed material. Considering the situation with seed germination, this measure is completely justified (it was used in practice in similar years) and, if necessary, will become one of the sources of covering the missing volumes of seeds,” said Serik Zhumangarin.
At the same time, to control prices in research institutions and experimental farms, a commission is created and the acceptance of seeds into the warehouse is activated. As the Deputy Prime Minister assured, the accounting department keeps records of their movement and sales in accordance with approved prices.