Ajinomoto develops clean and Mosaic Disease-free cassava stems, aiming to promote the sustainable productivity of Thai farmers

           Ajinomoto aims to support sustainable development of the agricultural sector through various integration activities to "help solve problems and lift up better livings for Thai agriculturists", especially cassava farmers, which is the key producer delivering "main raw materials" to the production process of the Ajinomoto Group’s products. This is in accordance with the company's policy, "The Ajinomoto Group Creating Shared Value (ASV)", that we adhere to continuously operating through all business activities.

           Recently, FD Green (Thailand) Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Ajinomoto Co., (Thailand) Ltd., has successfully developed the preparation of clean and Mosaic Disease-free cassava stems that will effectively reduce risk and prevent the spread of cassava Mosaic disease in Thailand. The company has delivered the qualified cassava stems to Asia Modified Starch Co., Ltd. and to King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi (Ratchaburi Learning Park) in the amounts of 6,700 stems and 1,260 stems, respectively, to test the effectiveness in this year and to further distribute to farmers in next year, which is expected to help farmers for more than 161 families to have high-quality cassava stems that can be used in their cultivation, covering an area of approximately 1,088 rai. This will be an important part of elevating the sustainable cultivation of Thai farmers while boosting productivity through the use of clean and high-quality cassava stems.

           From the current information disclosure, it was found that “cassava is one of the country’s economic crops, which Thailand has exported as the third largest in the world and generates income around 100 billion baht annually", but due to Cassava Mosaic Disease, the amount of productivity is lower than expected by more than 20–80% per year. It also increases the cost for farmers to find new disease-free stems to be used to plant new cassava in the next round of planting.

            The company believes that this project will improve the quality of life of Thai farmers by enabling them to grow more cassava without being affected by the pandemic cassava virus and lowering the cost of finding new cassava stems to replace the infected stems, which will increase farmers' income. Additionally, this execution can help reduce the problem of food waste from the loss of infected cassava production. This is aligned with our ambition to “uphold global sustainability” for the better quality of life of people worldwide.