Performance Evaluation of Banana Varieties, through Farmer's Participatory Selection

In many developing countries of rural areas, banana plays a significant role as source of economic growth, income, food security and nutrition. Seven dessert Banana cultivars were evaluated at West Hararghe, Mechara. The analysis of variance indicate that there were highly significant (p < .001) difference of all morphological traits except fruit diameter and fruit length. The highest yield ton ha(-1) was recorded for variety of Giant Cavendish (11.83 ton ha(-1)) but statistically on par with Robusta (10.67 ton ha(-1)) and Williams-1 (10 ton ha(-1)) and farmers in the study areas prefer Giant Cavendish, Robusta and Williams-I for yield and different morphological traits. These varieties also have the highest number of leaves as well as pseudo stem girth and plant height. Therefore, the varieties viz., Giant Cavendish, Williams-1 and Robusta are highly recommended to the society of west Hararghe zone. For future work, we recommended to conduct studies on nutritional quality leaves as feed for animals and fruit quality.