Effect of different types of sweet potato (Impomea batatas) cultivars on growth performance in woven polypropylene plastic bags
Date
2022-09-13
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Taylor & Francis Group - Informa UK Limited
Abstract
The sweet potato is one of the exceptionally healthy foods that requires low inputs for production. However, in South Africa the majority of people purchase their staple food, owing to land scarcity. The woven polypropylene plastic bag (WPPB) planting technology, could be a solution for food production in limited spaces. The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of different sweet potato cultivars on growth performance using the WPPB technology. Compared to the standard (‘Blesbok’) cultivar, all the tested cultivars (‘Bosbok’, ‘Bophelo’, ‘Mafutha’ and ‘Mvuvhelo’) had higher chlorophyll content. ‘Bophelo’ and ‘Mvuvhelo’ obtained thickest (0.40 and 0.45 cm) stem diameters. ‘Mafutha’ achieved the highest (64.30 cm) vine length and number of shoots (4.64). Noticeably, ‘Mafutha’ produced the highest (4.50) number of flowers compared to the standard. ‘Bophelo’ obtained the highest (122 g) dry shoot mass and ‘Bosbok’
recorded the highest (11.2) number of enlarged roots (NER). Contrary to that, ‘Mafutha’ had the lowest (3.4) NER. In conclusion, ‘Mafutha’ performed well in terms of the above-ground plant parameters, whereas ‘Bosbok’ was best with regard to the below-ground plant parameters. Therefore, planting ‘Bosbok’ and ‘Mafutha’ cultivars in WPPBs achieved the best below and above growth performances, respectively.
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© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The Version of Scholarly Record of this Article is published in Acta Agriculturae Scandinavica, Section B — Soil & Plant Science, 2022, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/09064710.2022.2117080 . Keywords: Food security; garden technology; planting bags; root crop; urban agriculture; sweet potato; Impomea batatas; Africa; South Africa; cash crop; smallholder farmers; loamy soil.
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Citation
Mudalahothe Ndwamato, Maila Yvonne, Shadung Given & Tseke Pontsho (2022) Effect of different types of sweet potato (Impomea batatas) cultivars on growth performance in woven polypropylene plastic bags, Acta Agriculturae Scandinavica, Section B — Soil & Plant Science, 72:1, 885-892, DOI: 10.1080/09064710.2022.2117080