Abstract
Banana and plantain are popular fruits considered as major staple foods, and provide significant income to farming communities. A handicap to their development and production remains access to quality suckers. However, their diversity is still unknown in Benin. To assess the knowledge on the diversity of local varieties of both dessert banana and plantain at the community level, ethnobotanical surveys were undertaken using participatory research appraisal tools such as direct observations, group discussions and field visits from 119 interviewees living in 63 villages from 24 communes districts in Central and South of Benin. A total of 121 farmer-named banana and plantain varieties (83 vernacular names for banana and 39 others for plantains) were recorded and gathered into 58 differentiated varieties on the basis of the significance of the vernacular name relying on morphological traits and medicinal uses. Southern ethnic groups hold higher local varieties (H = 3.15 bits for the ethnic group Fon and H = 2.09 bits for Wemegbé) due to the high rainfall conditions favorable for the development of banana species than those from Central-Benin (H = 0.64 bits for the sociocultural group Mahi). The main constraints to these crop productions were drought (23.8% of responses), stealing of the whole bunch (19.0%), pests and diseases (14.3%), susceptibility to flood (9.5%) and pseudostem break by wind (7.8%). In situ and ex situ conservation should be undertaken to preserve the varieties cultivated by a few households on small areas defining their vulnerability status as well as those most commonly produced in large amounts. Key words: Banana, plantain, parataxonomy, conservation, varietal diversity, Benin.
Highlights
The majority of cultivated bananas arise from the Eumusa, one of the four groups from the genus Musa (Daniells et al, 2001)
Banana and plantain are popular fruits, which are considered as major staple food and important components of food security for many households, and provide significant income to the farming community through local and international trade (Crouch et al, 1998)
We addressed the following questions: Do cultivated banana and plantain harbor differentiated local varieties? Are there similar local etymological names that would suggest a good parataxonomy? What is the level of varietal diversity according to district? Are there evidence of producers’ varietal preferences criteria and production constraints?
Summary
The majority of cultivated bananas arise from the Eumusa, one of the four groups from the genus Musa (Daniells et al, 2001). Plantain fruit is rich in carbon hydrate and highly energizing; it is an edible and sweet fruit consumed as dessert or as a cooked crop (plantain and banana) These fruit crops include 90% of banana and 10% of plantain (Lescot, 2006), and represented the second largest fruit crops of the world after citrus with a contribution estimated to be 16% (Debabandya et al, 2010). Banana is mainly cultivated for its highly nutritious and digestible mature fruit, which is considered as a source of energy (Jenny et al, 2003) It is rich in potassium and calcium with low sodium content as well as vitamins A and C, and carotene. In contrast to other crops such as cereals, the cultivation of banana and plantain appears to be a good biological plant species candidate adapted to climate change, because a temperature increase of 3°C remains favorable for their development (Calberto et al, 2016)
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