New Cassava (Manihot Esculenta Crantz) Varieties for MID and Low Land Agroclimatic Condition of Ethiopia

Abstract

Cassava verity verification trial was conducted at different agroclimatic condition of Ethiopia (Jima on station and two farmers field, Areka on station and two farmers field, Dilla on station and two farmers field, and Sekota on station and two farmers field). Unfortunately the trials at Sekota were devastated by drought and were not evaluated by variety releasing committee. The rest were visited and approved to be released for further production. Accordingly two out performing candidate varieties were selected and officially released. The two selected varieties were AWC-1 (MM96/7151) and 191/0427(TMS 191/ 0427) which yielded more than 45 t/ha on both research managed and on farmer managed conditions. Among the candidates, AWC-1 yielded 51.5 and 46.7t/ha on station and on farmers field respectively. On average the yield was by far higher than the local and standard checks. The yield advantage of the candidate variety AWC-1(Hawassa-4) over the standard and local checks was 58 and 86% respectively. In the same way, 191/0427 yielded 48.4 and 37.6 t/ha on station and on the farmers field respectively. The yield advantage of the candidate variety was 38 and 63% over the standard check and local check respectively. Eventually the two varieties has given names which can easily be understood by farmers, processors, merchants, consumers and others, and popularization through pre-extension demonstration is being carried out at different locations in the country.

Keywords: Cassava, Candidate, Popularization, Wider production