The Vegetable Seed Producers Network was a program organized by Seeds of Diversity and The Bauta Family Initiative on Canadian Seed Security. The programs served two functions:
- To produce vegetable and specialty crop seeds according to industry best practices, which could then be pooled for bulk-scale supply to vegetable farmers, gardeners, and other growers, and
- To ensure that our seed collection remained viable and of the highest quality possible, by continually supplying fresh seeds to replenish seed stocks as required.
The project aimed to address the need for bulk scale production of vegetable and specialty crop seed in Canada. There is a strong demand for domestically produced seed, but most of the vegetable seed grown in Canada is sold in small packet sizes for gardeners. The next big step is to scale up production to provide farm-scale, bulk quantities.
This project was funded in part through Growing Forward 2, a federal-provincial-territorial initiative. The Agricultural Adaptation Council assists in the delivery of Growing Forward 2 in Ontario.