Improving The Quality Of Organic National Seed Databases To Increase The Use Of Organic Seed And Propagation Materials In Europe

Summary

The purpose of the national organic seed database is to list the seed varieties for which organically produced seeds and vegetative propagation materials are available in the market. The correct functioning of the organic seed database can facilitate the use and distribution of organic seed by improving transparency of the organic seed market. Each EU member state is free to establish its own database, resulting in varying different specific technical solutions among countries. In this study, quality of existing organic seed databases in place in all 28 EU member states and Switzerland was evaluated using different usability criteria. Our analysis revealed that fully computerised databases are to be preferred as they can influence the user’s perceived completeness. Moreover, suitable support and training should be provided by the database managers to improve users’ comprehension of database and to increase ease of use.