Participatory selection impact on dry bean varietal diversity in eight western farms from Cuba

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Sandra Miranda

Abstract

The impact of farmers´ participatory varietal
selection was determined on dry bean varietal diversity of
eight farms from a Cuban rural community by using Shannon-
Weaver diversity and Margalef richness indexes, allowing the
analysis of variations in the number of varieties and relative
significance of each one in terms of farm area. Thus, the number
of bean varieties and surface area devoted to this crop were
calculated in four seedings, two of them after introducing the
new varieties selected by farmers in a diversity fair. There was
an important increase of Margalef index values in farms after
the fair, according to the significant increment of varietal
number per farm for both sowings, compared to its equivalent
seedings prior to the fair. On the other hand, Shannon index
values did not have a remarkable increase during the first
sowing after the fair, on account of a disproportion between
the areas from the old and new varieties, differently of the
second seeding, whose values increased significantly,
indicating the increment of those farms devoted to new varieties.
These results show that diversity fair is an efficient approach
to increase varietal diversity farms and those devoted to new
varieties; besides, the use of Shannon and Margalef indexes
constitute a complementary and single choice to study the
impact of a participatory selection on an agricultural crop
diversity in time.

Article Details

How to Cite
Miranda, S. (2012). Participatory selection impact on dry bean varietal diversity in eight western farms from Cuba. Cultivos Tropicales, 30(2), 10–14. Retrieved from https://ediciones.inca.edu.cu/index.php/ediciones/article/view/132
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Original Article