Cowpea is a potential food security crop that plays vital role in the food value chain as a cheap source of plant protein, vitamins and minerals. It is one of the major and most common leguminous grains that complement staple starchy food consumed in the diet by children, youth and adults across rural and urban communities in Ghana.
Over 70% of Ghana’s population consumes cowpea in different forms food. Despite consumer demand for cowpea, production is still low and largely restricted to the three northern regions, with an average farm yield of about 0.4 to 0.6 tone per hector as compare to achievable yield of about 1.6 to 2.5 tons per hector.
In line with this, a day’s assessment meeting has been organized at the Manga Agriculture Station, Bawku for the certification process.
The relentless efforts of research scientist to find an innovative means by adapting to an improved variety of seed, that can withstand climate change, improved yield and soil to help avert the perennial loses of farmers, has made yet another progress.
The National Variety Release and Registration Committee, (NVRRC) in collaboration with the University of Cape Coast UCC, lead Institution through the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research CSIR, Savanna Agriculture Research Institute SARI, University of Virginia, USA and the Ministry of Food and Agriculture MoFA has again certified another three Drought Tolerant, Stringa & Root rot disease resistant cowpea varieties.
This brings the number of improved certified cowpea to eight 8 since 2016 to date. The certification meeting was organized by SARI, Manga under the sponsorship of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for food and Agriculture ITPGRFA and Food and Agriculture Organization FAO.
Speaking to Radio Ghana, an entomologist and field officer 2 in charge of the Northern Sector Dr. Francis Kusi indicated that, Ghana still produces less cowpea than could meet consumer need and the deficit is filled by importation from neighboring countries.
He attributed the low production to factors such as biotic and abiotic stresses, lack of high yielding varieties, poor agronomic practices and underutilization of land and space in productive agro-ecological zones.
Dr. Kusi stated that, on-farm conservation, the crop is challenged by the parasitic weed Striga gesneroides Sg infestation resulting in up to about 100% yield losses in the three regions of northern Ghana.
He explained further that, the effect of the parricides, rust and viral diseases coupled with drought on yield loss of cowpea contribute to hunger and poverty among resource poor families in rural and urban communities.
He said that, the unreliable cultural practices to control striga, rust and viruses as well as drought necessitated the exploitation of resistant genes, involving the application of marker assisted selection protocols for genomics analysis, coupled with field evaluation of cowpea genotypes.
The coastal savannah agro-ecology has been exploited for the production of cowpea since rainfall pattern favor two times cultivation of the crop in a year.
He added that cowpea germplasm were obtained from SARI, CSIR and local farmer in Ashanti Regions of Ghana and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture IITA Ibadan Nigeria. He said farmers adapting to the improved variety, will increase cowpea production by 30%.
This will not only provide affordable protein-rich foods but also create jobs to generate incomes to improve livelihoods.
Plant breeders will also make use of available cowpea genetic resources tor continues improvement of the crop to sustain its industry in Ghana.
Dr. Kusi explained the economic value of cowpea as two times profitable and more nutritious than other cereal crops since plant protein is preferred to animal protein.
The Principal investigator and Project Manager University of Cape Coast Head of Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, Professor Aaron Tettey Asare threw more light on the potency of the new variety.
