NEEM NETWORK: PROCEDURES FOR
SEED COLLECTION AND EXCHANGE

(February 1995)
Prepared by
Mr. 0. Souvannavong, FAO, Italy and
Ms. K. Poulsen, Danida Forest Seed Centre, Denmark.

The purpose of this booklet is to facilitate the smooth exchange of neem seed in the International Neem Network. The valuable practical experience obtained from pilot seed exchanges in 1993 and 1994 is presented in a summarized and easily accessible manners. This experience may also be useful to other users.

• How to collect and process seeds? Which quantity is needed?
• How to pack and dispatch seeds?
• Which administrative/quarantine documents are needed for import of seed in a particular country? Which channel to use for dispatch from country A to country B? Whom to inform of the dispatch? When? How? Which are the alternative communication means?
• How to receive the seeds? What needs to be done on receipt of the seeds?

The full-scale seed collection and exchange will take place in 1995 for establishment of international provenance trials in 1996. To collect seeds from 27 seed sources for exchange among some 20 countries in 3 continents is quite a challenge for a 'normal' forest tree species. This is even more so for a species such as Neem, where the delay between seed collection and sowing should be kept under 1 month, because of the poor storability of the seeds.

It is stressed that all the procedures presented im this booklet should be strictly followed at every step. The final result will depend on how each of the successive operations (collection, processing, dispatch, etc.) is done. Therefore the publication should be distributed to all officers practically involved in neem seed collection and dispatch in each country. It is the responsibility of the national focal institution for the neem network to distribute the booklet.

The following procedures were agreed upon at the international neem consultation in Jodphur, India in February 1994 and should be strictly adhered to by all networkers. In order to include experiences from exchanges in 1994 a few adjustments were made.

• Information on seed sources to be collected from are found in annex A.
• Collect seed from at least 25 trees; trees collected from should be at least 50 meters apart.
• Collect. mature green-yellow fruits. Avoid brown, completely green or damaged fruits.
• Collect. fruit directly from the tree. Do not collect fallen fruit. Spread a cover on the ground beneath the tree to avoid soil contact.
• Approximately 120 kg of fruit with pulp corresponding to 165 liters should be collected per seed source (this corresponds roughly to 24 kg of clean stones/seeds corresponding to around 48,000 stones/seeds)
• Collect approximately equal amounts from each tree. (When 120 kg fruit is requested, and 40 trees can be collected from, then collect around 120/40=3 kg/tree corresponding to 4 liters/tree).
• Keep fruits from different trees separate during collection in order to check that amounts collected per tree are approximately equal and to check no. of trees collected from.
• Finally carefully mix together fruits from all trees to make one bulk. (single tree collections are not dispatched for provenance trials in the network).
• Use identification tags through all steps of handling (one tag inside the bag another tag outside, include on the tag: seed source name, number of trees collected from, quantity collected, dates of collection)
  
  

Fruit and seed are actively respiring and using oxygen, and should therefore never be covered in air-tight material like elastic. Seed should be spread out in a thin well aerated layer (i.e. not closely layered).

• The fruits should be depulped within 48 h. Collected fruit will have different ripeness stages and thus different colours. For the greenish fruits it is difficult to remove the pulp manually. In order to soften the pulp the greenish fruits can be picked out of the lot and after-ripened separately; they are spread out in a 2-3 fruit thick layer in the shade, protected from rain for 1-3 days and subsequently depulped (fruits must never be soaked!).
• After depulping, carefully wash stones in running water and remove all flesh.
• Surface-dry the seed for 1-2 days in the shade (protect from rain) in a windy well-ventilated spot, if necessary use fans. Spread seed in a mono-layer on newspaper, jute bags or similar material (not plastic!).
  
  

• Apply a small dose of fungicide.
• THE SEED MUST BE SHIPPED AS SOON AS POSSIBLE !!!
• Seed is packed in cotton bags with 0.5-1 kg of seed per bag. Each bag carries a tag inside as well as outside containing the following information: country, seed source name, number of trees collected from, quantity of seed in bag, dates of collection.
• Seed source name should he the name found in the table in annex A emphasized by fat types.
• Pack the cotton bags in a cardboard box and nake holes in the box for aeration. In order to allow aeration do not cram the bags into the box.
• Phytosanitary certificates are required for all seedlots to all countries.
• Import requirements and contact addresses for dispatch are found in annex B.
• Dispatch channels and amounts to dispatch through each channel are found in annex C.
• Receiving institute should always be notified by fax about: date and time of arrival, flight no., name, phone, fax, address of delivering agent, air way bill (AWS) no. or delivery note no.
• The shipping agent should guarantee temperatures above 15ºC during transport. Never put fruit/seed in the refrigerator (temperatures below l5ºC may not be tolerated).
• Based on collection period details etc. in table B, receiving networkers should request import permits in advance, as they will not get notice of arrival of seed in time to get the import permit.
• When the seed is received, it should be sown in the nursery as soon as possible. Sow the stones as they are, i.e. do not try to remove the hard layer.
• After receipt notify the sender and FAO that seed has been received.