Effects of Banana Varieties in Central and Eastern Kenya on Macropropagation Technique
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Date
2011
Authors
Kasyoka, M.R.
Mwangi, M.
Kori, N.
Mbaka, J.
Gitonga, N.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Agroforestry
Abstract
Kenyans obtain most of their food, livelihood, employment and foreign
exchange from the agricultural sector. Banana contribution toward this cannot
be over looked. Recently banana has become an important cash crop,
especially in Central and Eastern Kenya where income from traditional crops
especially coffee has drastically reduced. However, banana industry is faced
by many challenges among them lack of clean planting materials. Natural
.regeneration is inadequate and associated with high risk .of pest and disease
spread while tissue culture plantlets are priced above what will be affordable
for many small-scale farmers who are the main, stake holders.
Macropropagation technology relies on affordable and simple methodology
and can be done easily, with adequate training. This. has been used in other
countries; Cameroon, and Nigeria' to increase seedling at farm level. The
question is whether this technology can be used to propagate local banana
genotypes. To answer this, macropropagation chambers were set in different
location in Central and Eastern districts namely: Mathioya, Kirinyanga East,
Embu East, Meru Central and Imenti South. Fifteen corms of four different
varieties (Kampala, Cavendish, Sweet banana and kiganda) were initiated in
sawdust media in a chamber which humidity and temperature was increased.
Data was collected on earliness of sucker initiation and the number of suckers'
(plantlet) of the first 5 corms per variety. In all the six sites, there was a
significance variety difference on the number of days from corm planting to
sucker initiation; with Kampala variety taking shortest time and had more
plantlets per corm while Sweet banana took the longest time and had few
plantlets. The response clearly indicated that the 4 varieties can be propagated
through this technology to boost seedlings availability, banana production and
food security in Kenya.
Description
Keywords
Natural regeneration, Macropropagation, Seedlings availability, Tissue culture