Abstract
Fourteen Kabuli chickpea varieties released since 1974 were evaluated in 2017 cropping season at Akaki, Chefe Donsa, Debre Zeit, and Jari stations to determine genetic progress in yield and yield associated traits of Kabuli chickpea varieties. The varieties were laid out in a randomized complete block design with three replications. The average rate of increase in grain yield per year over the past 42 years period was 22.35kgha -1 yr -1 with a relative genetic gain of 1.04% year -1 , which was not significantly different from zero. The regression of hundred seed weight against the years of release showed significant increase for the last 42 years of improvement in Ethiopia. It showed an annual rate of genetic gain of 0.56 g yr -1 with a relative annual genetic gain of 4.37%. Number of pods per plant and number of seeds per pod revealed a significant decreasing trend over the past 42 years, which could be a reciprocate to the increased seed size. Plant height, days to flowering, and days to maturity showed non-significant trend in the current study. Grain yield showed non-significant positive association with plant height, days to flowering, number of pods per plant and non-significant negative association with days to maturity, number of seed per pod and hundred seed weight. Hundred seed weight was positively and significantly correlated with days to maturity but negatively and significantly correlated with number of pods per plant and number of seeds per pod. Therefore, the Kabuli chickpea improvement program needs special attention to compliment seed size and grain yield by using integrated breeding approach to make rapid progress in developing superior Kabuli chickpea varieties. Keywords: Kabuli chickpea, Grain yield, hundred seed weight, Genetic gain DOI: 10.7176/JBAH/10-15-04 Publication date: August 31 st 2020
Highlights
Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) is an annual diploid with 16 chromosomes and genome of 740 Mbp (Jain et al, 2013)
The results of the present study indicated that the Kabuli chickpea improvement program that employed selection from introductions as major breeding methods was successful in improving grain yield, though the rate of gain is negatively accelerated in time
This experiment clearly revealed that improved genetic progress was obtained from breeding Kabuli chickpea in Ethiopia for seed size than it was for grain yield
Summary
Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) is an annual diploid with 16 chromosomes and genome of 740 Mbp (Jain et al, 2013). Chickpea is consumed as food in several different forms and preparations are determined by ethnic and regional factors (Ibrikci et al, 2003). Chickpea seeds are consumed at green pods stage without any processing These different forms of consumption provide consumers with valuable nutritional and potential health benefits. Understanding the changes produced by crop breeding on grain yield and its determinants is important to evaluate the efficiency of past improvement works on the advances in genetic yield potential, and to define future strategies to facilitate further progress. The current initiative was aimed at critically assessing the rate of genetic gain achieved in Ethiopian Kabuli chickpea breeding program at diverse agro-ecological locations so as to devise effective breeding strategy for further improvement. The purpose of present study was to determine genetic progress in yield and yield related traits of Kabuli chickpea varieties. There appear one oldest type variety release from local sources, a full-fledged breeding program for Kabuli type chickpea has mainstreamed in the early1980s
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