An Economic Analysis on the Use of Hot Water Seed Treatment, Mulching and Pruning in the Control of Black Rot Disease in Cabbage within Kisii County

Abstract

Cabbage farming in Kisii County is faced with a number of challenges, top among them being pests and disease damages. Black rot disease has been identified as one of the major reason responsible for the low yields in cabbage. As such, a number of Biotechnological approaches such as Mulching, hot water seed treatment, pruning, biocontrol agents, use of resistant varieties and chemicals have been employed to manage the disease. However, these approaches have been found to have many shortcomings such as being expensive and thus increasing the cost of production, causing environmental pollution, not easily available to the farmers and others have even failed to manage the disease effectively hence subjecting farmer to risks of losing their investment capital. Therefore, this research study was carried out with the main objective being to examine the economic analysis of using hot water seed treatment, mulching, pruning and plant debris management to control black rot disease in cabbage farms. 50 grams of Gloria Hybrid cabbage seeds were inoculated with 10 4 CFU/ml (Colony Forming Units) suspensions of the field bacterial isolates. A portion of the inoculated seeds was then treated with hot water using the Miller et al., 2005 ISTA (International Seed Testing Association) standard procedures while the second portion was left untreated. All the seeds were then established in separate nursery beds in a greenhouse for a period of 3 weeks before being transplanted into the main field where the impact of hot water seed treatment, mulching, pruning and plant debris management on cabbage yield through disease management was evaluated. The marketable yield was arrived at by working out the average weight of the individual cabbage heads randomly sampled from on-station field experiments in the two seasons running from 2017-2018. The data obtained was analyzed using the Statistical Analytic system (SAS) with Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) to establish whether there was any significant difference among yields from the various field treatments. The 2017-2018 local market price rates and KALRO (Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization) cost rates were used to compute the net benefits and value/cost ratios (VCR). The results obtained showed that integration of all the three methods had the highest % yield increase (78.3 %) with the highest VCR value of 6.2 hence was recommended as the most profitable technology for managing black rot disease in cabbage farms.

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Electrically Charged Disinfectant Containing Calcium Hydrogen Carbonate Mesoscopic Crystals as a Potential Measure to Control Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris on Cabbage Seeds

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