PARTICIPATORY EVALUATION AND DEMONSTRATION OF FINGER MILLET (Eleusine coracana) TECHNOLOGIES AND THEIR CHARACTERISTICS IN SOUTH GONDAR ZONE OF NORTH WESTERN ETHIOPIA

Participatory demonstration and evaluation of finger millet technologies was conducted at South Gondar Zone of North Western Ethiopia. Besides, recently released variety was used under this demonstration to evaluate its performance with old varieties. It was particularly conducted with in two districts which have differences to some extent in terms of agro ecological and farming system. Four varieties were demonstrated and evaluated at twelve locations and/or sites and evaluated relying on varietal characteristics, farmers’ preferences and feedbacks. Farmers’ variety or local variety which is a variety available at farmers’ hand and cultivated for long time was used as standard check for comparison. Six demonstrations were conducted at the site of Farmers Training Center (FTC) and others were at farmers’ own fields. Quadrant system of yield estimation was employed to estimate average and relative yields of each variety. Regarding yield estimation, in general tesema variety performed highest comparing with others including the local variety. There were no statistically significant mean yield differences among demonstrated varieties between two districts in which demonstrations taken place. However, the average yield of tesema variety was statistically significant from the national average yield recorded by Ethiopian Central Statistical Agency (CSA). All demonstrated and improved varieties had relative yield advantages over local variety. There were also relative yield advantages between improved varieties themselves. Grain color, size, cooking quality, animal feed (palatability), biomass, marketability and disease resistance were identified as the main determinants of variety selection for farmers and different key stakeholders. Relying on this work and preference of varieties, further large scale demonstration need to be conducted to each of the site where demonstrations were undertaken. Variety releasing and development by respective breeders shall to take those variety selection criteria and farmers’ preferences in to account so as scale up and out reach the technology.