Assessment of advanced cowpea cultivars for agronomic and yield traits in Uganda.

Abstract

Cowpea, Vigna unguiculata (L.) is the most important legume grown in the semi-arid tropics and one of the world's major legumes. It is adapted to the Sahelian climate which is characterized by low rainfall and poor soil fertility. It originated and was first domesticated in Southern Africa and was later moved to East and West Africa and Asia. It is a multi-purpose indigenous crop that grows largely in the tropics of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). It is reported that 95.6% of the area under cultivation of cowpea leaves worldwide in 2017 was in Sub Saharan Africa. Uganda is ranked the 8th largest producer of cowpea in Africa, grown by over 2.2 million smallholder farmers with total annual production of nearly 22,000 tons. Cowpea in Uganda is grown throughout the country but Eastern and Northern region being the 1st and 2nd largest producers in the country. Although cowpea yield potential in Uganda ranges between 1500 - 3000kgha, farmer’s yields are constantly below 500kg per hectare due to pests and diseases, poor varieties, farming methods and market access causing a yield gap of about 2,500 kgha. It is upon this background that an experiment was undertaken at BUAC farm to asses advanced cowpea cultivars for agronomic and yield traits. The experiment was set up using Alpha lattice design with three replications having 5 smaller incomplete blocks. The study objectives were to determine the growth and yield performance of different advanced cowpea cultivars and to determine the correlation between the growth and yield parameters of the advanced cowpea cultivars. Significance variations where observed in most of the parameters and the growth traits positively correlated with yield except for the plant height. Commendable yield was observed in NAROCOWPEA3, 4 and 5, MUALMP-19-119, MUAL19-25-1, MUALMP-17, FT20A132, Bruc2019B-468 Par47*LGC074/29 and Par47*LGC074/30 cowpea cultivars and therefore, can be further exploited for its genetic potential and distributed to farmers for production since they produce the highest yield. The significant genetic variation among genotypes suggested that the genotypes were genetically diverse and it could be a good opportunity for breeders to select genotypes for trait of interest for variety development.