Participatory Varieties Selection and Evaluation of Improved Sweet Potato (Ipomoea batatas (L.) On-Farm at Different Agro-ecologies in Wolaita Zones Southern, Ethiopia

Aim: Ethiopia is considered to be one of the major producers of sweet potato and involves major lands for this purpose. Whereas, varieties of sweet potato that yields maximum are not yet known. So this particular study is aimed to identify the variety for high yield, quality sweet potato, as well as its quantitative evaluation to be done.

Materials and Methods: Area situated at Wolaita zone of SNNP regional state is considered as study venue; whereas the performance of fields is evaluated and specified the number of crop yield of that particular area.

Results and Discussion: Eleven sweet potato varieties and four local varieties were prepared for the preliminary evaluation. Observations came up with the following varieties namely OFSP1, Kulfo, Koka 6 and Hawassa 83 which were mostly preferred by farmers. Both sweet potatoes had high acceptability; with an average score of 10,11,12,16, (A) and 17, 18 19, (B) out of a maximum of 20, without any significant differences in preference. The varieties were divided into four sets, with each set having two test varieties and the check variety. This is to ensure that farmers will not have difficulty in evaluating and comparing too many varieties.

Conclusion: Variety of the potatoes that are preferred by the farmers is different from each other, which are come up with Participatory varietal selection (PVS) technique. So as differences in ranking are also preferred by them, which later ensure the genetically diverse factors and differentials in growing yield of the crops.