Abstract: Food and nutrition insecurity has been a major challenge in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). With land frontier closing, farmers in SSA must intensify and diversify food production to alleviate food and nutrition insecurity. In the face of climate change, African Indigenous Vegetables (AIVs) can offer opportunities to diversify production systems and improve food, nutrition and income security in many countries of SSA. Despite their potential, the importance of AIVs in alleviating food, n...
ABSTRACT A non-weighing lysimeter was designed, fabricated, tested and installed at Arochukwu, Abia State, Nigeria, where the farmers who engage in dry season vegetable production do so with no knowledge of irrigation water requirements. This method tends to either over-irrigation or under-irrigation below the vegetable water requirements. Too much water can leach costly fertilizers to depths below the root zone, where both the water and fertilizer are permanently lost. Too little water caus...
ABSTRACT African leafy vegetables are a good source of vitamin A, vitamin C, and foliate among others. They are also a complementing source of other vitamins such as thiamine, niacin and riboflavin, plus some dietary minerals including calcium, iron, potassium, zinc, copper and manganese. Decline in crop yields is mainly caused by loss of soil fertility. Phosphorus (P) is one of the critical elements that limit vegetable production. The situation is aggravated in smallholder agriculture where...
ABSTRACT Botswana is classified as an upper middle income country and despite having attained such economic growth, the country still faces socio-economic challenges such as poverty. The current poverty rate is 20.7% while rural poverty is 24.7% which is relatively higher for an upper middle income country. In order to address this problem, the government introduced the Poverty Eradication Programme. This study therefore, sought to assess the income, expenditure and consumption dimensions of ...
The greenhouse technology is a booming segment of agriculture in the world, because it offers a favorable climate conditions which increase plants growth as the plants are grown in a controlled environment. This research assessed the present conditions of the Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) in Ghana and emphasized on issues that are paramount to Greenhouse vegetable production effectiveness. The general objective was to evaluate the current status for greenhouses in Ghana and p...
ABSTRACT A non-weighing lysimeter was designed, fabricated, tested and installed at Arochukwu, Abia State, Nigeria, where the farmers who engage in dry season vegetable production do so with no knowledge of irrigation water requirements. This method tends to either over-irrigation or under-irrigation below the vegetable water requirements. Too much water can leach costly fertilizers to depths below the root zone, where both the water and fertilizer are permanently lost. Too little water ...
ABSTRACT The sandy soil in the Keta Sand Spit, Southeast Ghana is infertile but is used for intensive vegetable cultivation. The vegetable production systems are managed with large amounts of irrigation water and fertilizers on sandy soils with low inherent water and nutrient retention capacities. The long term sustainability of a shallow groundwater lens which is used for irrigation in the area is threatened by several consecutive years of over withdrawal. Also, the shallow groundwater which...
ABSTRACT Vegetable production in general and pepper production, in particular, is of paramount importance in the economic life of rural and peri-urban farmers in Senegal. However, high input costs such as seeds and chemical fertilizers are a limitation to the sector's growth. In order to find technologies capable of producing quality seeds with cheaper inputs, this study was conducted at the Djibelor Agricultural Research Centre in the southern region of Senegal. Six treatments T1 (NPK 300 k...
ABSTRACT The use of recommended agricultural practices such as the safe adoption of pesticides is influenced by several factors as identified in the evaluative frame of reference. These factors have often led to the existing gap between farmers‘ knowledge and pesticide use. The purpose of the study was to examine the contribution of socio-economic factors to the application of skills acquired through training on the safe use of pesticides in vegetable production in the Accra Metropolitan As...
ABSTRACT The reactive nature of phosphorus leads to the formation of insoluble Fe, Al and Ca bound phosphate compounds in highly weathered tropical soils, thus limiting P availability for plant uptake. Biochar with its heterogeneous surface properties can influence phosphorus dynamics in tropical soils. To examine phosphorus fractions in a biochar-amended Plinthaqualf, samples were taken from low yielding soils in northern Ghana that had three cycles of vegetable production under clean and w...
ABSTRACT Envirodome greenhouse technology has become a widely accepted and profitable system for vegetable production particularly in Ghana. However, plant varieties best suited for the Envirodome have not been fully exploited in Ghana. Thus, an experiment was carried out at the Forest and Horticultural Crops Research Centre (FOHCREC), Okumaing-Kade in Ghana from July 2018 to April 2019 to assess eight different types of tomato for some morphological and yield attributes under Envirodome gree...
ABSTRACT Tephritid fruit flies are a major threat to the horticultural industry in sub-Saharan Africa owing to the heavy losses they cause to fruit and vegetable crops, and the resultant quarantine restrictions. Addressing the fruit fly menace in Ghana requires effective stakeholder training along the fruit value chain, coupled with adequate research information on management strategies. Baseline studies were conducted in northern Ghana to determine the priority management training needs of f...
ABSTRACT Continuous irrigation has been observed to degrade soil quality, through leaching of soluble and colloidal materials, development of saline conditions and breakdown of soil structure. Evaluating the quality of soils give information on the current soil condition as has resulted from previous soil management practices such as continuous application of fertilizer, and direct future management practices to sustain the soil ecology. Soil physical parameters (aggregate stability); Chemica...
Microgreens are edible baby plants with huge potential for leafy vegetable production and many consider this plant-based functional food as the new “Superfood”. Microgreens have many advantages over sprouts and they help to improve the nutritional value of our diet, with their high content of healthy compounds. During the microgreen cultivation, seeding is usually done as a broadcast or in rows and as the seeding density is difficult to recommend, most growers prefer to seed as thickly as...
ABSTRACT Quality seeds constitute one of the basic and the most important inputs in any vegetable crop production endeavour. A post-certification surveillance was undertaken to evaluate the quality of certified imported and local vegetable seeds at commercial retailers’ end in the distribution and marketing chains in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. Structured questionnaires were administered to 18 commercial vegetable seed retailers who constituted the main vegetable seed delivery channe...