African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security

African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security ISSN 2375-1177 Vol. 9 (1), pp. 001-009, January, 2021. © International Scholars Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Assessment of vitamin A content and sensory attributes of new sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) genotypes in Ghana

George Ofori¹, Ibok Oduro¹*, W.O. Ellis¹ and K. Harrison Dapaah²

¹Department of Food Science and Technology, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.

²Crops Research Institute (CSIR), P. O. Box 3755, Kumasi, Ghana.

Accepted 30 June, 2020

Abstract

A study was conducted to assay the vitamin A contents of the leaves and roots of twenty four (24) newly bred sweet potato varieties and also assess the sensory attributes of the roots. Four months old genotypes of sweet potato leaves and roots were obtained from Fiaso, in the Brong Ahafo Region of Ghana, and were analysed using the reverse phase HPLC techniques for their –, ß– and total carotenoid contents. A farmer participatory approach was used in the assessment of the sensory attributes of both boiled and fried samples of sweet potato roots. Xushu 18 was the most preferred variety, followed by TIS 2534 and Beauregard 566613 for the boiled roots. SPK 004 was the best preferred variety for the fried roots, followed by VSP 4 and Beauregard 566613. The fresh sweet potato leaves recorded total carotenoid levels of 2228 – 9173.8 µg/100 g, -carotene of 508.7–3660.8 µg/100 g and - carotene of 34.4 – 1904.6 µg/100 g. The data obtained for the roots ranged from 225.4 – 5243 µg/100 g for total carotenoid, 13 – 2145.6 µg/100 g for -carotene and traces of -carotene with the exception of 8 samples that recorded values in the range of 0.1 to 473.9 µg/100 g. It was observed that varieties or genotypes with high levels of leaf provitamin A carotenoid recorded low values in roots and vice versa. -carotene was the most dominant provitamin A carotenoid in both the leaves and roots of the sweet potato varieties. Varieties with high levels of carotenoid for both leaves and roots can therefore play a complementary role in initiatives designed to reduce vitamin A deficiency.

Key words: Carotenoids, roots, participatory approach, complementary.

African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security ISSN 2375-1177 Vol. 8 (12), pp. 001-010, December, 2020. © International Scholars Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Adoption of irrigated wheat varieties among agro-pastoralists; The case of Fentale District, Upper Awash Valley of Northeastern Ethiopi

Getinet Belay Wondim^1*, Adam Kedir² and Rehima Musema^2*

^1*2 Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research, Werer Agricultural Research Center, Werer, Ethiopia.

^2*Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Accepted 21 September, 2020

Abstract

This study was intended to examine the rate at which the hitherto pastoralist communities are adopting the newly popularized irrigated wheat varieties, and the factors influencing adoption decisions. The study employed multi-stage sampling procedures to select 120 sample respondents from four pastoral kebeles in Fentale district of northeastern Ethiopia. Logit model was used to analyze the determinants of adoption while simple descriptive analysis of percentage, mean, frequency as well as chi-square and t-tests were used to describe the characteristics of sample households. The study reveals that the rate of adoption of irrigated wheat varieties among farmers is 18%. The logit estimate showed that level of education of household head, family size in adult equivalent, extension access to wheat, access to training and presence of off-farm activities have positively and significantly influenced the probability of being adopter. However, age of household head and distance to the main irrigation water source (main canal) had negative effect on the decisions of farmers to adopt irrigation wheat varieties. Strengthening extension services, providing comprehensive and continuous practical and theoretical trainings and improving irrigation water distribution through maintaining secondary and tertiary canals are areas of intervention for rapid and continuous adoption of irrigated wheat varieties.

Keywords: Adoption, Irrigated wheat, Upper Awash, Fentale, Northeastern Ethiopia, Logit.

African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security ISSN 2375-1177 Vol. 8 (12), pp. 001-008, December, 2020. © International Scholars Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Broodstock feeding effects on spawning performances’ (fertility, eggs and larvae quality) of the Mediterranean red porgy (Pagrus pagrus, Linnaeus 1758) during two years

Azeddine Abrehouch^1*, Mohamed Idaomar², Ali Ait Ali¹, Hassan Nhhala¹ and El Mostafa Talbaoui¹

¹Centre Spécialisé en Aquaculture, BP 31, INRH, M’diq. Morocco.

²Faculté des Sciences, Université Abdelmalek Essaad, Tétouan, Morocco.

Accepted 23 April, 2020

Abstract

Spawning in captivity of two broodstock groups of red porgy (Pagrus pagrus) of the same age was studied during two consecutive spawning seasons. These two broodstock groups, designed as A and B, were fed with different regimes during the spawning period. Group A was fed on moist pellet while group B was fed on fresh fish. Total number of collected eggs was 22 and 36 million respectively for groups A and B during the first year. Fecundity was 474,966 and 769,186 eggs kg^-1 female respectively. During the second year, total number of collected eggs was only 5 million for group A and 32 million for group B. The fecundity was 192,094 and 1.1 million eggs kg^-1 female respectively. Statistically, there was a significant difference between the slopes of the two groups in terms of quantity and quality of spawning and larval survival recorded on the second and fifth day after hatching. The viable egg rate was positively correlated with the second day larval survival, which in turn was significantly correlated with hatching egg rate. These data showed that time of collecting eggs for incubation, does not affect hatching rate and larvae survival rate.

Key words: Pagrus, red porgy, spawning, egg quality, fertility.

African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security ISSN 2375-1177 Vol. 8 (11), pp. 001-007, November, 2020. © International Scholars Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Weed/corn seedling recognition by support vector machine using texture features

Lanlan Wu* and Youxian Wen

College of Engineering and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, P. R. China.

Accepted 23 August, 2020

Abstract

This study investigated the effect of a new approach, the support vector machine, as a classifier tool to identify the weeds in corn fields at early growth stage. Image segmentation was done by transforming original color images to gray level images according to the statistical values of red, green, blue components. The Gray Level Co-occurrence Matrix (GLCM) and statistical properties of the histogram from the gray level images were further used to obtain the texture features of the weeds and corn seedlings. These texture features were used in the classification procedure. Principle component analysis was used to select the texture features according to their better contributions to reduce space dimensions. A Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier was employed to recognize the weeds and the corn seedlings. The results indicated that the SVM classifiers with different feature selections could identify successfully weed-corn with a higher accuracy ranged from 92.31 to 100%. A comparison study of the recognition capabilities of SVM and back-propagation (BP) neural-network classifier using the same data set was conducted. It was found that the SVM classifier provided the best recognition performance with an accuracy of 100%, which exceeded the accuracy of 80% given by the BP classifier.

Key words: Corn seedling, weeds, texture, support vector machine, recognize.

African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security ISSN 2375-1177 Vol. 8 (11), pp. 001-004, November, 2020. © International Scholars Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Seed size effect on grain weight and agronomic performance of tef [Eragrostis tef (Zucc.) Trotter]

G. Belay*, A. Zemede, K. Assefa, G. Metaferia and H. Tefera

Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research, Debre Zeit Center, P.O. Box 32, Debre Zeit, Ethiopia.

Accepted 27 August, 2020

Abstract

Tef [Eragrostis tef (Zucc.) Trotter], the indigenous Ethiopian cereal, has a very minute seed size, yet it has a strong bearing both on the preferences of farmers for planting material and consumers as quality measure. The objectives of this study were to determine the effects of sieve-graded seeds on the grain weight of tef, and to investigate whether large seed size offers yield and agronomic advantages over using un-graded planting seed materials. Seeds of two tef varieties, DZ-01-974 and DZ-Cr-37 (early type) were sieve-graded in to five seed size treatments, and were field grown at Debre Zeit and Akaki experiment stations, in 2005 and 2006, along with the un-graded seed (Mix) as a control. A split-plot design replicated three times in randomized complete block arrangements was used; varieties were used as main plots while seed sizes were kept as sub-plots. Grain yield, days- to-panicle emergence (DPE), plant height, biomass yield and panicle length were considered. There was clear increase of 100-seed weight when seed size increased. However, seed size effects were statistically significant, but not agronomically meaningful, only for DPE. Generally, there were trends of increased grain yield (up to 7%) due to large seeds, but the advantages for the other traits were nil. Relative growth rates (RGR) were similar for the seed-size groups, and therefore, were unable to explain the lack of significant effects. In conclusion, under optimum production conditions, the added advantages of large seed size do not justify tef-seed grading. On the other hand, farmers may consider the use of smaller size seeds for planting and sell large size seeds for consumption purpose.

Key words: Eragrostis tef, seed size, tef, tef agronomy.

African Journal of Agriculture and Food Security ISSN 2375-1177 Vol. 8 (10), pp. 001-008, October, 2020. © International Scholars Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Critical period of weed control in winter lentil under non-irrigated conditions in Turkey

Murat Erman¹, Isık Tepe², Bekir Bükün³, Reyyan Yergin⁴ and Mehtap Ta kesen⁵

¹YÙzüncÙ Yil University, Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Field Crops 65080 Van, Turkey.

^{2, 4, 5}YÙzüncÙ Yil University, Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Plant Protection 65080 Van, Turkey

³Harran University, Faculty of Agriculture, Department of Plant Protection 63040  anlıurfa, Turkey.

Accepted 16 September, 2020

Abstract

This study was conducted during the growing seasons of 1998 - 1999 and 2003-2004 to determine the critical period of weed control (CPWC) in winter-lentil (cv. Sazak- 91). The experiments were laid out in a randomised block design with four replications. The beginning and end of CPWC were based on 5% acceptable yield loss levels which were determined by fitting logistic and Gompertz equations to relative yield data, representing increasing duration of weed-interference and weed-free period, estimated as growing degree days (GDD). The results indicated that CPWC for seed yield was between 237 and 846 GDD in the first year and between 123 and 414 GDD in the second year, while CPWC for biomass was between 216 and 820 GDD in the first year and between 212 and 374 GDD in the second year. Thus weeds should be controlled from the first week after the onset of regrowing stage of the crop in spring up to 7^th week for winter-lentil to avoid losses above 5%.

Key words: Lentil, critical period, weed competition, weed interference.