Agronomic Performance of Young Cashew Trees Cultivated in Association with Groundnuts

Abstract

Cultural association is widely practiced in rural areas by cashew nut producers. These producers typically cultivate annual plants between the rows of young cashew trees. However, there are interactions between these associated crops, which can either result in complementarity or competition among the plants for environmental resources such as water and nutrients. Consequently, young cashew seedlings newly planted were associated with groundnuts during their first two years. The aim of this study was to investigate the compatibility of the cashew/groundnut system. The results showed that there is competition between groundnuts and young cashew trees in the first year, leading to poor cashew growth in association. Nevertheless, from the second year onwards, cashew trees cultivated in association exhibited similar growth to those cultivated in monoculture. Therefore, it would be advisable to plant groundnut seeds sufficiently far from cashew tree seedlings to avoid potential competition in the first year of cultivation.