Who will be testing seed in commercial and government seed laboratories in the future?
In the last several months there has been considerable discussion in the industry about whether there are enough Registered Seed Technologists (RST’s) and Certified Seed Analysts (CSA’s) to fill the industry needs. If not, where can more be trained, and how can we encourage more people to enter the profession. This article will deal with RST’s and CSA’s and our discussion will be limited to those people trained for purity and viability testing. Colorado State University in co-operation with the Society of Commercial Seed Technologists, the Association of Official Analysts, SeedQuest, the American Seed Trade Association along with the industry have expressed interest in learning if there is a need for University level training of Seed Analysts and Technologists. To begin with let’s review the history and background. The number of seed analysts in this country comprises just over 300 RST’s and CSA’s combined. Since it is not a profession with a large number of people, the training facili
