Soon to be located at Amazon’s Arlington, Virginia Headquarters (HQ2), the AWS Innovation Studio will serve as a center for scaling the impact our customers can have on improving the communities in which we live, work, and learn. I encourage everyone involved in sweet potato activities at any level of the value chain to read this book, which contains much useful information.Today, I was thrilled to announce the first AWS Innovation Studio at the AWS Summit – Washington, DC. Innovations and challenges at various levels along the value chain are discussed as well as suggestions on ways of overcoming or reducing their effects. The book is aimed at assisting all stakeholders, including the poor, to access information on nutrition and to boost local economies. Currently, Kenya has an estimated area of 90,000 ha under sweet potato the corresponding estimated production was 1.2 million tonnes compared to 880,000 tonnes in 2008 (FAOSTAT, 2015).This book is expected to help understand the concepts and techniques of sweet potato production, utilization, and marketing as well as the existing innovations and opportunities for further innovations. The crop is ranked among the high-priority crops for food security and poverty alleviation for the urban and rural poor. The importance of sweet potato as a staple crop in Africa has been highlighted at the African Union level. (Word count: 291 words) Key Words: Vitamin A deficiency GEI stability AMMI regression analysis acceptance Abbreviations: AMMI=Additive Main effects and Multiplicative Interaction BS=Busia GEI=Genotype x Environment Interaction KB=Kabale MP=Mpigi NK=Nakasongola OFSP=Orange Fleshed Sweet Potato WK=Wakiso SPVD=Sweet Potato Virus Disease VAD=Vitamin A Deficiency Genotypes SPK004/6, SPK004/6/6, SPK004/1/1, SPK004/1 and Dimbuka are recommended for release SPK004/6 and SPK004/6/6 need to be promoted specifically to combat vitamin A deficiency, whereas SPK004/1/1, SPK004/1 and Dimbuka are mainly for reducing food insecurity in Uganda. SPK004/6 was the most preferred while NASPOT 5/50 was the least preferred genotype based on taste attributes. Genotypes NASPOT 5/22 and SPK004/6 were the most stable while SPK004 and SPK004/6/6 were the least stable. Dimbuka, SPK004/1/1 and SPK004/6/6 were better adapted at Kabale. Genotypes Dimbuka, SPK004/1/1, SPK004/6/6 and SPK004/6 had above average root yield under high yielding environments of Nakasongola, Kabale and Busia, whereas NASPOT 5/63, SPK004/1, SPK004 (check), NASPOT 5/22 and NASPOT 5/50 had below average root yield and fell under low yielding environments of Mpigi and Wakiso districts. Genotypes and environments accounted for 38.84% and 21.51%, respectively, while genotype x environment interactions accounted for 0.01% of the total variation for root yield.

Data were collected on sweetpotato virus and Alternaria disease infection, root yield, weevil infestation, and taste attributes analysis was done using regression and AMMI model in GenStat. The objectives of the study were to assess the adaptability and acceptability of promising OFSP genotypes in varied agroecologies of Uganda. The orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP), with its high beta-carotene (provitamin A) levels, is regarded as the most affordable and sustainable food-based strategy for combating VAD. VAD can lead to disorders such as xerophthalmia, the leading cause of preventable childhood blindness, anemia, weakened host resistance to infection and premature death.

In Uganda, VAD affects 20% of women of child-bearing age and 18% of children below five years. Vitamin A deficiency (VAD) is a major public health problem affecting 127 million children under age five and more than 7 million pregnant women in developing countries.

Udig innovation studio