Aims: The study was carried out in 2020 at Bal’ad District, Middle Shebelle, Somalia to investigate the post-harvesting losses on tomato production.  Methodology: The research used a descriptive survey research design particularly cross-sectional study, and it was quantitative in nature. From the population, the study selected 109 sample size as to represent the population by using Slovin formula with the maximum acceptable error of 5 %. The sampling procedure was non-probability particularly purposive sampling. Primary data were collected using questionnaire survey and field observations. Descriptive statistics such as frequent, figures and percentages were used and analyzed with the package of statistical package for Social Science technique (SPSS 22.0). Findings: The results revealed that on-farm losses viz. too much irrigation after fruiting the tomato (96.3%), high winds (85.3%), improper harvesting stages (90.8%) and incidence pests and disease (93.5%) were affecting the tomato production in Bal’ ad district accompanied by off farm losses occurred due to lack of good infrastructure (96.3%), delaying transportation vehicles long time during inspection check point leads decaying (90.9%)and lack of consistent market (86.2%). The study suggested that the farmers should be provided technical training on the management of post-harvest losses of tomato production.

Aims: SARTEC conducted an experimental study with the objective of determining the effects of various nitrogen rates on sunflower growth and yield in the Afgoi district, Lower Shabelle region. Materials and Methods: The study was carried out at the SARTEC experimental farm in Afgoi during the Der season of 2020. The experiment used a Russian kind of sunflower and was laid out in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with four replications and four plots for each. The crop was fertilized with different rates of N at 50, 100, and 150 kg ha-1, with a control/unfertilized plot included in each of the replications. Plant height, head diameter, hundred-seed weight, seed, straw, and biological yield, as well as harvest index, were all measured on five plants from each plot for data collection. Results: The different fertilizer rates applied to the sunflower crop resulted in highly significant variations in yield and yield components. Seed-related parameters like seed weight and seed yield were influenced substantially more than other variables, including plant height; stem diameter, head diameter, and straw yield. Despite having the highest seed yield, plots with 150 kg of N ha-1 were not more cost-effective than plots with 100 kg ha-1. Conclusion: In Somalia, 100 kg of N per hectare is the ideal rate for maximizing sunflower revenue and production while adhering to best management practices.

A laboratory experiment regarding germination and seedling growth test was conducted with three black gram genotypes tested under three salinity levels (0, 75 and 150 mM), for 10 days, in sand culture within small plastic pot, to investigate the germination and seedling growth characteristics. Different germination traits of all black gram genotypes, like germination percentage (GP), germination rate (GR), coefficient of velocity of germination (CVG) greatly reduced, as well as mean germination time (MGT) increased with increasing salt stress. At high salt stress, BARI Mash-3 provided the highest GP reduction (28.58%), while the lowest was recorded (15.79% to control) in BARI Mash-1. Salinity have the negative impact on shoot and root lengths, fresh and dry weights. The highest (50.32% to control) and lowest reduction (36.39%) of shoot length were recorded in BARI Mash-2 and BARI Mash-1, respectively, under 150 mM NaCl saline conditions. There were significant reduction of root lengths, root fresh and dry weight, shoot length, shoot fresh and dry weight in all genotypes under saline condition. The genotypes were arranged as BARI Mash-1 > BARI Mash-3 > BARI Mash-2, with respect to salinity tolerance.

Aims: The field experiment was conducted to evaluate new sesame varieties for growth and yield performance. Study Design: A randomized completely block design (RCBD) with four replications was used for the experiment. Place and Duration of Study: The study was conducted during the Deyr season (September-November) 2016 at the experimental farm of Somali Agriculture Technical Group (SATG), Afgoye, Somalia. Methodology: Growth and yield characters of the varieties were measured during the trial. A complete of six sesame varieties was used for the trial. The new varieties were Setit, Yemeni, Nigerian, Humera and Indian while a local variety, Dunyar, was used as a control. Results: Results from the experiment revealed that growth parameters such capsule length, number of branches per ∙plant, number of capsules per plant and number of seeds per capsule were significantly different among the varieties. Yield performance of the sesame varieties was also significantly different. It was observed that Humera variety showed the highest seed yield of 2.82 ton per hectare while the Indian variety has given the lowest seed yield of 0.67 ton per hectare. The highest straw yield of 3.45 ton per hectare was recorded for Local variety while the lowest straw yield of 2.76 ton per hectare was observed in Setit variety. Likewise the highest biological yield of 6.18 ton per hectare was observed at Dunyar variety while the lowest biological yield of 3.61 ton per hectare was recorded for Indian variety. Conclusion: The growth and yield of these particular varieties did not outperform the local variety, thus, future studies would be essential to look for other alternative methods and cultivars that would help increase the productivity.

In this study, an experiment was conducted to determine the best rate of nitrogen fertilization on maize grain yields and interaction of nitrogen levels and application methods of nitrogen on growth and yield of maize. For this purpose, the maize experiment was designed in the experimental farm of Somali Ministry of Agriculture, in Afgoi, Lower Shabelle, Somalia in 2017 spring and autumn. The treatments consisted of eight rates (0 kg N ha-1; 25 kg N ha-1; 50 kg N ha-1; 75 kg N ha-1; 100 kg N ha-1; 125 kg N ha-1; 150 kg N ha-1 and 175 kg N ha-1.) Nitrogen and three applying methods (broadcasting, row placement, and hill placement). The layout of the experiment was designed in Randomized Complete Block Design with three replications. A total of 9 parameters viz. plant height (cm), number of cobs plant-1, cob length (cm), cob weight (gr), 1000 grain weight (gr), stover yield (t ha-1), grain yield (t ha-1), biological yield (t ha-1) and harvest index (%), were collected. The collected data were analyzed statistically and means were adjudged by Duncan's Multiple Range Test at 1 and 5% level of probability. Both in the spring season and In the autumn season, according to the nitrogen rates, the result showed that there was significantly different in all characters among the different application rates of nitrogen the maximum stover yield was recorded in 100 kg N ha-1 while the maximum grain yield was noted from 100 kg N ha-1. Both in the spring season and In the autumn season in the methods of application, there was no significant variation in all parameters measured but the interaction effect was significantly different among the treatments, the maximum stover yield and grain yield  were recorded in 100 kg N ha-1 and hill placement. Thus, applying 100 kg N ha-1 and the method of row placement is promising to increase the maize yield and the study is required to be repeated for one more season.