On-farm performance of landraces

Bioversity International is a member of the CGIAR Consortium. CGIAR is a

global research partnership for a food secure future.!

Contact persons:!Carlo Fadda

(c.fadda@cgiar.org)!Jeske van de Gevel

(j.vandegevel@cgiar.org)!

Participatory Variety Selection

The Seeds for Needs approach is a series of projects carried out in different locations across the world. It aims at building resilient and adaptable farming systems by exposing farmers to more crop varieties, increasing farmers knowledge about different traits and strengthening local seed systems. Scientists, local partners and farming communities are exchanging knowledge, experiences and technologies. Seeds for Needs uses different methods and tools based on local needs but works towards one common goal: to decrease vulnerability in smallholder farming communities by increasing the intraspecific diversity of commonly used crops.

Genebank accession

On-station trials

On-farm trials

Locally adapted seed systems

We screen thousands of accessions held in national gene banks and select clusters of suitable material using bioclimatic variables. The material is planted in different on-station trials to cover a broad range of climatic conditions. Based on comprehensive characterization of the material the best performing accessions are selected for participatory mother and baby trials. Baby trials will provide insights in farmers’ preferences and acceptance of varieties. In addition we ‘crowdsource’ the best performing varieties to a larger group of farmers to increase knowledge on different varieties and access to locally adapted seeds.

TRAIT SELECTION

We asked participants to choose the most important traits for selecting cowpea and sorghum. Most people will select a variety on the following traits: high yielding, early maturing, marketability and drought tolerance. These traits are deemed most important and are consistent across sites and across crops. For cowpea the leaf size, leaf taste and whether a plant creeps or climbs is important. For sorghum colour, grain, panicle size and cooking time are important. While men mentioned treshability and plant height, women tend to focus on traits after harvesting such as taste and resistance to post-harvest storage pests.

To identify the best performing accessions according to farmers own selection criteria, we set up participatory variety selections in each of the mother trials. The crops were examined by groups of women and male farmers based on a set of traits that was selected by the farmers themselves. !Local farmers were invited to the mother trial in their village and shown the plots with different varieties. They were asked to give an individual score from 1 to 5 for each of the 8 traits for each plot representing one accession. Gendered groups were separated to see whether there is a difference between selection of the best performing accessions. From discussions earlier and the selection of most important traits it would be likely that women prefer other varieties than men.

Cowpea Drought Resistance

Early Maturity

Grain size!!

Colour Leaf amount

Leaf size Creeping-Climbing variety

Yield

Sorghum Drought Resistance

Early Maturing!

Grain size

Colour Panicle size

Ability to market

Pest and Disease resistance

Yield

Best performing varieties

The selection of best performing varieties were the same for both men and women. It should be mentioned that most farmers in Hombolo prefer white varieties of sorghum and red sorghum are not popular for eating. Most of the varieties we tested are red in colour. For cowpea most people prefer black varieties and varieties that are climbing instead of creeping as they see this as a sign of early maturity. !The top 3 sorghum accessions farmers selected: Men: TZA3965, GBK33644, GBK441 Women: TZA3965, GBK33644, GBK33984 !Results from the crowdsourcing trials where we asked over 500 farmers in each site to grow a selection of 3 of our varieties will confirm and provide more data on the morphology of preferred varieties.

RESEARCH SITE HOMBOLO

We have planted 4 mother trials, 12 baby trials and 500 crowdsourcing trials in Hombolo district (100 km2) near Dodoma, Tanzania. It is a semi-dry area near Hombolo dam (constructed in 1957: coordinates  -6.00 and 35.9167). The crops observed in the farms are: pearl millet, sunflower, simsim, bambara groundnut, watermelon, maize, sorghum, hibiscus, pumpkins. On the markets you will find tomatoes, potatoes, banana’s, chili peppers, maize, onions. 

TZA3965 GBK33644

GBK33984

GBK441

Contact persons:!Dan Kiambi

(d.kiambi@abcic.org)!John Yumbya!

(j.yumbya@abcic.org)

For our trials in the previous season we selected 62 sorghum, 20 cowpea and 32 pigeon pea accessions from the national genebank in Kenya and in Tanzania. We planted them on research stations in Katumani, Arusha, Hombolo and Morogoro. From this initial experiment we selected the 20 best performing varieties of sorghum and used them for our trials. The mother trials are planted with both cowpea and sorghum in 2 replicates, the baby trials consist only of sorghum with no replicates. Baby trial farmers were advised on how and when to weed and compensated for their time and labour. The planting was done together with field coordinators from ARI Hombolo.  !Based on grain yield per plot only the five best performing varieties are TZA3991, TZA4369, GBK033644, GBK028460 and TZA3965. These preliminary results lack a full analysis of our morphological data.

Table 2: Trait selection for Participatory Variety Selection of Cowpea and Sorghum in Hombolo

Accession MaturityMin days

Max days Avg

Diff mean

Avg yield/plot

TZA4027 Early 60 84 76.88 -8.70 1498.5TZA4171 Early 74 86 78.50 -7.08 1651

GBK000441 Early 75 97 82.13 -3.45 1526.125GBK033644 Early 77 89 82.38 -3.20 1998TZA3991 Early 75 93 82.38 -3.20 1932.25TZA3965 Late 80 105 88.63 3.05 1704.375

GBK 034278 Late 78 103 89.13 3.55 1615.25TZA4369 Late 76 106 89.13 3.55 2257.625TZA4021 Late 82 106 89.63 4.05 1493.625

Table 1: Days until flowering from sowing for early maturing and late maturing varieties

Performance in Grain yield/plot for mother trials in Hombolo - Tanzania

Bwawani Makulu Mkoyo Zepisa

885

2676

14131445

Average

Fig 2: There is a big difference in overall performance between the four mother trials. All accessions performed better in Mkoyo.

Wote

Hombolo

Nyando

Fig 1: Project research sites in Kenya and Tanzania

Nairobi