The Hebrew word neta means a plant, seedling, or young plantation. It is the noun form of nata (H5193), meaning to plant. The word is used of literal plantings in vineyards and gardens, and metaphorically for Israel as God's planting, and for the coming messianic Branch planted by God.
The planting metaphor runs throughout the Old Testament as a way of describing God's purposes for Israel and ultimately for His kingdom. Israel is God's neta — His carefully planted people in the land of promise. When they bore the wrong fruit (injustice instead of righteousness, as in Isaiah 5), the vineyard-owner dug it up. But the prophets look forward to a new planting — a shoot from Jesse's stump (Isaiah 11:1), a righteous branch (Jeremiah 23:5). Jesus takes up this imagery directly in John 15 ('I am the true vine') and in the parable of the Sower — the Word of God as seed, and human hearts as soil. Neta thus points toward the eschatological community growing in righteousness.