Abstract

Right planting time, use of improved cultivars and good agronomic practices are the major strategies for increasing tomato production. Therefore, a screen house experiment was conducted during 2017 and 2018 at Kabba college of Agriculture, Kogi state, Nigeria to investigate the variable characteristics associated with tomato cultivars aimed to assess the most promising tomato cultivar to be adopted for large-scale production based on their yield and fruit quality. Ten local and ten exotic cultivars were selected for the study. Seedlings were raised in a nursery and transplanted to the screen house at four weeks after planting. The experiment was laid out in complete randomized design with each treatment replicated three times. Data was obtained for growth, yield and quality parameters and were subjected to analysis of variance using Fisher least significant difference (FLSD) at 5% probability level. The result from the experiment indicated significant differences in all the growth and yield parameters. The fruit quality and storability also varied across the cultivars. The result of the study showed that Dankarufi, Ishaze, Boomarang, Cobra and Riogrande were significantly better than other cultivar in terms of yield and storagibility as the recorded 0% fruit rot at day 10 of the study compare with Aho aveg, Gou, and Igede local that recorded 80% fruit rot at day 10 of the experiment. Dankarufi, Ishaze, Boomarang, Cobra and Riogrande are therefore recommended for future study in quest for the development of high yielding and longer storability tomato fruits for large scale or commercial production.