Volume 39, Issue 3, May 2023, Pages 1328–1339
OUATTARA Tièba Victor1, Seydou TUO2, Théodore Alla Kouadio3, EPONON Eboa Christophe Ghislain4, KASSIN Koffi Emmanuel5, KOKO Kan Louis Anselme6, Maméri Camara7, and DICK Acka Emmanuel8
1 University of Jean Lorougnon Guédé, UFR Agroforesterie, BP 150 Daloa, Côte d’Ivoire
2 Université Félix HOUPHOUET BOIGNY, UFR Biosciences, Laboratoire de Physiologie et Pathologie Végétales, 22 BP 586 Abidjan 22, Côte d'Ivoire
3 Institut Pédagogique National de l’Enseignement Technique et Professionnel, Département de Formation des Formateurs aux Métiers de l’Agriculture, 08 BP 2098 Abidjan 08, Côte d’Ivoire
4 University of Félix Houphouët-Boigny, UFR Biosciences, 22 BP 582 Abidjan 22, Côte d’Ivoire
5 Département Agronomie Physiologie, Centre National de Recherche Agronomique, Abidjan, BP 808 Divo, Côte d’Ivoire
6 OCP-Africa, 01 BP 528 Abidjan 01, Côte d’Ivoire
7 Centre National de Recherche Agronomique (CNRA), 01 BP 1740 Abidjan 01, Côte d’Ivoire
8 University of Félix Houphouët-Boigny, UFR Biosciences, 22 BP 582 Abidjan 22, Côte d’Ivoire
Original language: English
Copyright © 2023 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
To ensure the sustainability and productivity of the cocoa crop, replanting on non-forested sites such as old orchards or young fallow lands raises the problem of the survival and establishment of seedlings, due to the low fertility of the soil, particularly in phosphorus. Thus, in order to minimize mortality and improve juvenile growth and flowering precocity of cocoa trees, organic, mineral and organo-mineral fertilizers were applied to a fallow land with low phosphate fertility, in Soubré, in the southwest of Ivory Coast. The experimental design was a partially balanced incomplete block design with 12 treatments and three replications. The treatments consisted of two fertilizer applications per year for each plant: compost (T1); phospho-compost (T2); TSP + compost (T3 and T4); NPK based on natural phosphates (T7, T8 and T9), combined with compost (T5 and T6) or phospho-compost (T10 and T11) at different doses. Growth parameters and flowering were evaluated. Treatments T2 (phosphocompost 1 kg), T3 (TSP 75 g + compost 2 kg) and to a lesser extent T11 (NPK 0-15-15 300 g + phospho-compost 1 kg) were the most efficient. They allowed a better growth, a good precocity of crowning and flowering. All the treatments tested did not impact the mortality rate of young cocoa trees. These results could allow farmers to exploit favorably soils with low fertility, with the guarantee of a good establishment of cocoa plants in the field during the juvenile stage.
Author Keywords: Cocoa tree, fertilization, replanting, growth, flowering, Ivory Coast.
OUATTARA Tièba Victor1, Seydou TUO2, Théodore Alla Kouadio3, EPONON Eboa Christophe Ghislain4, KASSIN Koffi Emmanuel5, KOKO Kan Louis Anselme6, Maméri Camara7, and DICK Acka Emmanuel8
1 University of Jean Lorougnon Guédé, UFR Agroforesterie, BP 150 Daloa, Côte d’Ivoire
2 Université Félix HOUPHOUET BOIGNY, UFR Biosciences, Laboratoire de Physiologie et Pathologie Végétales, 22 BP 586 Abidjan 22, Côte d'Ivoire
3 Institut Pédagogique National de l’Enseignement Technique et Professionnel, Département de Formation des Formateurs aux Métiers de l’Agriculture, 08 BP 2098 Abidjan 08, Côte d’Ivoire
4 University of Félix Houphouët-Boigny, UFR Biosciences, 22 BP 582 Abidjan 22, Côte d’Ivoire
5 Département Agronomie Physiologie, Centre National de Recherche Agronomique, Abidjan, BP 808 Divo, Côte d’Ivoire
6 OCP-Africa, 01 BP 528 Abidjan 01, Côte d’Ivoire
7 Centre National de Recherche Agronomique (CNRA), 01 BP 1740 Abidjan 01, Côte d’Ivoire
8 University of Félix Houphouët-Boigny, UFR Biosciences, 22 BP 582 Abidjan 22, Côte d’Ivoire
Original language: English
Copyright © 2023 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
To ensure the sustainability and productivity of the cocoa crop, replanting on non-forested sites such as old orchards or young fallow lands raises the problem of the survival and establishment of seedlings, due to the low fertility of the soil, particularly in phosphorus. Thus, in order to minimize mortality and improve juvenile growth and flowering precocity of cocoa trees, organic, mineral and organo-mineral fertilizers were applied to a fallow land with low phosphate fertility, in Soubré, in the southwest of Ivory Coast. The experimental design was a partially balanced incomplete block design with 12 treatments and three replications. The treatments consisted of two fertilizer applications per year for each plant: compost (T1); phospho-compost (T2); TSP + compost (T3 and T4); NPK based on natural phosphates (T7, T8 and T9), combined with compost (T5 and T6) or phospho-compost (T10 and T11) at different doses. Growth parameters and flowering were evaluated. Treatments T2 (phosphocompost 1 kg), T3 (TSP 75 g + compost 2 kg) and to a lesser extent T11 (NPK 0-15-15 300 g + phospho-compost 1 kg) were the most efficient. They allowed a better growth, a good precocity of crowning and flowering. All the treatments tested did not impact the mortality rate of young cocoa trees. These results could allow farmers to exploit favorably soils with low fertility, with the guarantee of a good establishment of cocoa plants in the field during the juvenile stage.
Author Keywords: Cocoa tree, fertilization, replanting, growth, flowering, Ivory Coast.
How to Cite this Article
OUATTARA Tièba Victor, Seydou TUO, Théodore Alla Kouadio, EPONON Eboa Christophe Ghislain, KASSIN Koffi Emmanuel, KOKO Kan Louis Anselme, Maméri Camara, and DICK Acka Emmanuel, “Improvement of juvenile growth and flowering of cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.) by different types of fertilizers in southwestern Ivory Coast,” International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies, vol. 39, no. 3, pp. 1328–1339, May 2023.
