Efforts to combat Vitamin A deficiency in children and pregnant mothers have focused on promotion of nutritionally enhanced food security crops. Such efforts have recently targeted the production and consumption of these crops. The orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP) is one of the most known nutritionally-enhanced crops. However, access to quality planting materials of OFSP and most vegetatively propagated crops by farmers remains a major constraint. This study used discrete and count data regression models and data collected from 732 farm households in Tanzania to test the effect of participation on a project designed to break this quality "seed" bottleneck (via technology awareness and targeted access to clean planting materials) on: i) the decision to conserve planting materials during dry periods for future planting and ii) the number of conservation strategies used by farmers. The study found that participation in such a project increases both the likelihood of conserving quality planting materials and also the number of conservation strategies employed by the farmers. It also found that varietal attributes and the agro-ecology of the area affect conservation of OFSP planting materials. It concludes that Downloaded by [University of Sussex Library] at 12:33 24 August 2015A c c e p t e d M a n u s c r i p t 2 awareness and access to clean sweetpotato planting materials of nutritionally-enhanced crops promote farmers' conservation of own planting materials. The study discusses the policy implications of the findings.
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