Originally published on cgiar.org by:International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) on May 2, 2007

Dar es Salaam, Tanzania – Scientists of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) have developed varieties resistant to Cassava Brown Streak Disease (CBSD) in collaboration with their counterparts at the National Agricultural Research Systems in Tanzania .This dreaded root rot disease-has been ravaging the cassava belt at the Great Lake Region.

 

The disease is called cassava brown streak disease (CBSD) and the causal pathogen is called Cassava brown streak virus (CBSV) and it causes yield losses in cassava of 20-80% affecting people's livelihoods all over Eastern Africa. For example, the disease is the most limiting factor in the food security efforts of Tanzania whose 40 million people depend on the crop for their daily caloric intake. In economic terms CBSD causes an annual loss of about US$50 million for the farmers in Tanzania. Dr. Caroline Herron, IITA plant pathologist studying the dynamics of the virus in East Africa says "In the last five years CBSD also has invaded Kenya, and moved westwards around the shores of Lake Victoria into Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo, and moved down Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique."

 

Dr. Edward Kanju, IITA cassava plant breeder and Mr. Haji Saleh, Ministry of Agriculture, Kizimbani, Zanzibar, say that "the farmers involved in the participatory breeding project 'drove' the government to officially release the CBSD field resistant cultivars and that the challenge is to replace the weak plants with the newly released resistant ones." New Scientist today features a detailed story providing further background information to the problem and solution of this

devastating disease http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/mg19426002.000-africas-ca.