is the corporate foundation of East West Seed with a unique focus on smallholder farmers. It is a market leader in Southeast Asia and has rapidly expanding markets in India, Africa and Latin America. In 2019, The World Food Prize recognized the EWS founder Dr. Simon Groot as its 2019 Laureate. EWS was ranked #1 in the 2019 Access to Seed Index. In 2009, EWS became Myanmar’s first fully registered international vegetable seed company. EWS has supported intensive farmer training programs since 2000 as a core part of its business model. This is implemented through EWS Knowledge Transfer (a non-profit foundation), established to leverage a market-based approach to upgrade farmer skills in less developed areas. By creating opportunities for income development, its work catalyzes the development of competitive agroinput markets and increases the availability of safe-to-eat and affordable vegetables in markets supplying lower income consumers. More specifically, East West Knowledge Transfer has some 10 years of presence in Myanmar and was active in a wide range of projects, all related to vegetable farmer training and demonstration. The non profit organization is working independently in regions in Myanmar where the seed industry does not yet have a commercial base. The approach for farmer training and demonstration has been developed in a joint effort with the International team of WPR and has been proven to be very successful, effective and efficient.
is a agricultural consultancy firm from The Netherlands, with presence in Vietnam and in Myanmar. Fresh Studio in Vietnam was initiated in 2006, by a small group of people versatile in expertise, and who shared a clear vision and drive for sustainable agriculture. Fresh Studio works for the private sector, including world players in distribution, processing and retail. Fresh Studio has now become a leading consulting firm in Southeast Asia for the sourcing and marketing of agricultural produce. With over 100 staff, four offices, one R&D farm and three large post-harvest centers for fruit, vegetables and fish, Fresh Studio is hands on and works with tangible objectives and is motivated to endeavor high quality and responsible production methods. Fresh Studio has a presence in Myanmar since 2016 and has a local team of 10 team members, agronomists, agricultural economists, processing specialist and business developers. The team is based in Yangon and since 2019 also has a local presence in Southern Shan State, Nyaung Shwe. Fresh Studio has executed value chain projects around vegetables, corn, spices, mango and recently around potato. In the vegetable and corn projects, the focus was really on improving the farming practices, preferably in line with the Myanmar GAP standard and making the connection with the markets.
The international team of Field Crops with 8 full time agronomists, socio economist and trainers, is specialized in smallholder vegetable and potato agronomy in tropical countries. In Myanmar the team has been active since 2013 and has built a strong knowledge base and farmer network with local non-governmental partners. The international team also developed and implemented the Myanmar Vegcap program, various potato training programs and a training program in for the Mungbean export chain for sprouting in the EU. The international team of WPR worked closely with both East West Knowledge Transfer and Fresh Studio in the past 15 years.