Assessment of on-farm performance of common bean in central rift valley areas of Ethiopia

Abstract

Common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) is an essential crop in Ethiopia and the Central Rift Valley of Oromia regional state for food and cash. However, the actual grain yield of common bean on smallholder farmers is low (~1.7 t ha−1) compared with the grain yield (~3.0 t ha−1) obtained in the on-station research and relative to a potential grain yield of 3.5 t ha−1. To improve the productivity of the crop, more than 54 high-yielding, multi-disease-resistant common bean varieties were released. This study, therefore, was implemented to assess the performance of the newly released common bean varieties through large-scale demonstrations and create wider demand. This was implemented for two years (2019–2020) on 69 ha by participating 85 farmers. The average grain yield of SER-125, SER-119, and Awash-2 were 2.5 t ha−1, 2.5 t ha−1, and 2.0 t ha−1, respectively. The results of the present study indicated that improved production practices using the recently released varieties resulted in higher grain yield advantages over the farmers’ practices in all districts. The newly introduced varieties were also preferred by farmers because of high-yielding, early maturity, and drought-tolerant traits. There should be an appropriate system that delivers the seed to the common bean producers for the sustainable production of common bean through the deployment of improved common bean technologies. In addition, research institutions should focus on solving insect (Bean stem maggot) and diseases (Rust and Halo blight) to improve the production of common bean in the study area and areas with similar agro-ecology.