Quinoa’s response to different sowing periods in two agro-ecological zones of Burkina Faso.
From Firenze University Press Journal: Italian Journal of Agrometeorology
Abdalla Dao, Institut de l’Environnement et de Recherches Agricoles (INERA), Burkina Faso
Amidou Guira, Institut de Développement Rural (IDR), Université Nazi Boni, Burkina Faso
Jorge Alvar-Beltrán, Department of Agriculture, Food, Environment and Forestry (DAGRI), University of Florence
Abdou Gnanda, Institut de Développement Rural (IDR), Université Nazi Boni, Burkina Faso
Louis Nebie, Institut de Développement Rural (IDR), Université Nazi Boni, Burkina Faso
Jacob Sanou, Institut de l’Environnement et de Recherches Agricoles (INERA), Burkina Faso
In recent years, the expansion of quinoa beyond traditionally grown agro-ecological zones has increased scientific attention. Portrayed as a highly nutritional crop, quinoa’s spread is the result of an optimal adaptation to adverse environmental conditions.
High tolerance to heat and drought-stress conditions, and great performance under saline and unfavourable soils have been reported within the Mediterranean, Middle East and North African (MENA) and Sahel regions (Hirich et al., 2012; Coulibaly and Martinez, 2015; Bazile et al.,2016; Dao et al., 2016; Habsatou, 2016; Mosseddaq et al.,2016).
The great adaptability of quinoa to abiotic stress-es is the result of a wide genetic diversity (Bazile, 2015). The recent discover of the quinoa genome sequence has open new opportunities for identifying desirable geno-types for specific regions (Jarvis et al., 2017). The great genetic diversity of quinoa shows that there is space for developing new and more productive varieties that can cope with more intensified and recurrent environmental stresses (Gandarillas et al., 2015).
To optimize the productivity of the crop, it is important to identify the most suitable sowing dates by adjust-ing ontogenesis (chronology of phenological stages) to the best environmental conditions. Sometimes, environmental stresses are unavoidable; therefore, minimizing the effects of adverse environmental conditions at plant’s most sensitive stages (flowering and seed germination) becomes imperative. However, determining the most appropriate sowing dates of highly sensitive crop’s to photoperiodicity is more complex.
This is the case of quinoa, with genotypes ranging in cycle from 80 days to more than 200 days (Bertero, 2001; Rojas et al., 2015). For this crop, it is widely accepted that the shorter the photoperiod the more rapid the plants flower, being its sensitivity to photoperiod and temperature a function of origin (Jacobsen, 2003). It is accepted that genotypes growing in the tropics are more sensitive to photoperiod and have a longer vegetative phase when compared to genotypes grown by the sea and at the Andean altiplano (Jacobsen, 2003).
However, other experiments, under controlled environmental conditions, have shown that different genotypes are highly sensitive to day length, with very little differences on the time to flowering; but having great variances on time to maturity (Christiansen, 2010; Bertero, 2015a). Also, some affirm that day lengths over 12 hours tend to have an undesirable effect on the development of the plant (Jacobsen, 2015). This is the case of genotype Titicaca, with a time to maturity of 134 days in Germany (34 °N) and less than 90 days in Burkina Faso (11 °N) (Präger et al., 2018; Alvar-Beltrán et al., 2019a).Quinoa is a new crop recently introduced in Burkina Faso (Dao et al., 2016) and up until now, there has not yet been a study examining the adaptation of quinoa to the different agro-ecological zones.
Hence, this study was carried out with the objectives to evaluate the effect of sowing dates on phenological and agronomic traits of quinoa, to evaluate plant growth and grain yield performance of quinoa varieties in two agro-ecological zones and to determine the optimal growing calendars in Burkina Faso.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.13128/ijam-731
Read Full Text: https://riviste.fupress.net/index.php/IJAm/article/view/731
