College of Dryland Agriculture and Natural Resources

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    Genetic Diversity in Finger Millet Collections for Agro-Morphological, Nutritional Traits, and its Seed Exchange Systems in Tigray, Ethiopia
    (Mekelle University, 2024-11-24) Fikre Hagos Abay
    Finger millet, despite being one of the most neglected and underutilized crops worldwide, serves as an important food source for millions of poor farmers in Africa. This study examined 200 finger millet accessions collected from different regions of Ethiopia and other African countries, including Eritrea, Zambia and Zimbabwe obtained from the Ethiopian Biodiversity Institute. The experiment was carried out using a 20 x10 lattice design across three locations and over two growing seasons, in 2019 and 2020. Data were collected for quantitative traits, including grain yield, 1000 seed weight, tiller number per plant, finger number per panicle, finger length and width, plant height and days to maturity; qualitative traits such as seed pericarp persistent, glume color, seed color, finger branching, and ear shape; and nutritional traits including protein, starch, calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), iron (Fe) and zinc (Zn) contents. The study also involved 160 respondents to analyze seed social network. The analysis of variance for quantitative traits showed highly significant (P≤0.01) variations among the tested genotypes. Three mega-environments were identified from the six tested environments, the first included Rama 2019 and Rama 2020, the second included Maiaini 2019 and Maiaini 2020, and the third included Zana 2019 and Zana 2020. Based on grain yield and other target traits, the GGE approach selected genotypes 203246 (21), 100022 (4), and 100020 (3) for Rama; 234184 (175), 229736 (114), and 233759 (143) for Maiaini; and 100022 (4), 203246 (21), and 229736 (114) for Zana. According to the frequency analysis of qualitative traits, all phenotypic classes, including seed pericarp persistence, glumes color, seed color, finger branching, and ear shape were observed across all countries of origin and altitude classes. However, the most frequent traits observed were non-seed persistence (46%), purple glume color (39%), black seed color (39%), and open ear shape (47%). Notably, brown seed color and persistent seed were absent in Zambia and Benishangul collections, respectively. The chisquare test showed significant (p≤0.05), highly significant (p≤0.01), and non-significant variations for the five qualitative traits across different countries. All the four qualitative traits, except for finger branching showed a high Shannon diversity index (H' ≥ 0.74) across various regions and altitude classes. However, the seed color showed a medium Shannon diversity index for Eritrea collections (H’ =0.65). In terms of protein content, it ranged from 5.15 to 9.35% with the highest value obtained from accessions 203574 and the lowest from 203358. The study found a minimum variation in starch content among different finger millet genotypes, with values ranging narrowly from 72% to 75% and an average of 72.99%. A similar trend was observed for moisture content.xxi On the other hand, there was a considerable variation among genotypes for mineral contents, including Ca (139 to 431mg/100g), Mg (120.85 to 525.50 mg/100g), Fe (3.4 to 30.68 mg/100g), and Zn (0.11 to 4.89 mg/100g). Notably, high concentrations of Ca, Mg, Zn, and Fe were found in genotypes 234160, 203259, 203257, and 203262, respectively. Genotypes 234184, 100020, and 203246 exhibited impressive levels of Fe (28.16 mg/100g), Zn (3.15 mg/100g), and Ca (407 mg/100g), along with high grain yields of 3368, 4112, and 3693 kg ha-1, respectively. A survey of finger millet growing households revealed that out of the participants, 145 (90.4%) cultivated landraces (referred to as farmers’ varieties or FVs), while 16 (10%) grew improved varieties. Seed exchange primarily occurred between neighbors and relatives, with a higher seed flow rate observed within villages compared to outside. Seven farmers in central and six in the Northwest zones of Tigray played vital roles in the seed network as key players. Therefore, the promising genotypes that demonstrated high-yield production and stability in this study should be further tested in multiple environments alongside the released finger millet varieties to verify their superiority and adaptability.