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Background: In Tunisia, faba bean (Vicia faba L.) is the first major food legume. The development of faba bean production is facing several biotic constraints. Faba bean Ascochyta blight caused by Ascochyta fabae is one of the most destructive diseases of faba bean and can cause significant yield loss under favorable conditions. As only incomplete resistance ABL varieties are available, some agronomic practices should be applied to control and reduce Ascochyta blight incidence wherever possible. Therefore, this work was undertaken to evaluate the effect of spacing row and seed rate on ABL severity, growth and yield of faba bean. Methods: A split-plot design with three replications was adopted to carry out this study during 2018 and 2019 cropping seasons. ‘Bachaar’ faba bean variety was sown at 40 and 60 cm row spacing and at three seed rates (100, 140 and 200 kg ha-1). ABL severity was assessed visually on a 0-9 scale and agro-morphological traits were measured. Analysis of variance was used to analyze the data. Correlations between agronomic traits, row spacing, seed rate and ABL severity were investigated. Result: Results showed that seed rate has a larger effect on yield than row spacing. In both cropping seasons, the highest grain yield was recorded in 60 cm row spacing and 140 kg ha-1 seed rate treatment. So, this treatment is recommended for obtaining high yield of faba bean. Most of the variation in disease severity was associated with seed rate (r=0.62). The highest ABL score severity was noted at 200 kg ha-1 rate. Over both years, wide row spacing and low seed rate reduced ABL severity. In this study, the small amounts of ABL disease (which reached a score of 5.3 and 4.7 in 2018 and 2019, respectively) had little or no effect on yield.

Background: In Tunisia, water deficit and heat stress during the end of cycle are more frequent and causes significant yield losses. Selection of short cycle lines could be a good solution to escape the effect of heat and drought during the end of cycle. Furthermore, there is little published information on the effect of the sowing date on yield and its components in lentils. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of the sowing date on yield and its components of some lentil lines. The best productive and early lines will be selected and therefore proposed for registration in the official catalog of plant varieties. The availability of these varieties to farmers could increase lentil production. Methods: Sixteen genotypes of lentil out of which 14 were advanced lines and 2 were checks varieties were used in this study. The field experiment was conducted during the 2017-2018 cropping season at Kef research station located in a semi-arid zone in north western Tunisia. Genotypes were sown on December 15th, 2017 and February, 7th, 2018. Seventeen agro-morphological parameters were recorded. Result: Based on agro-morphological analysis, lentil lines exhibited considerable genetic variability. Among the tested lines, L3 line seem to be the earliest lines. It showed high yield as well in timely and late sown dates. This line deserves more attention to develop short-cycle and high yielding variety.

This study used sequence specifc amplifcation polymorphism (SSAP) markers to investigate the genetic diversity and population genetic structure of nine Tunisian Vicia faba populations belonging to the minor and major faba bean's sub-species. Three primers were used (PDR1, Tps19 and Tvf4) in this study. These primers gave good SSAP marker profiles, high number of bands obtained per gel and a high percentage of polymorphic bands as confirmed in a previous study. Indeed, these primers provided a total of 173 amplified bands, with 123 of them being polymorphic. Shannon indexes ranges from 0.166 to 0.248 with an average of 0.207. The genetic diversity within population of 0.743 was clearly higher than that of among population genetic diversity (Dst = 0.138), indicating an out-crossing predominance in the studied populations. The Dst value showed that 15.6% of the total genetic variation resided among populations, a little lower than that of out-crossing species. The dendrogram grouping the populations by unweighted pair-group method with arithmetic averages (UPGMA) method revealed three main clusters. The local major faba bean 'Batata' was the most divergent population and was separated from other population.

In Tunisia, lentil (Lens culinaris subsp. culinaris Medik.) is cultivated in arid and semi-arid areas. Terminal drought and heat stresses during the end of cycle causes significant yield losses. Selection of short cycle varieties could be the best option to escape the effect of pre cited abiotic factors. ‘krib’ was developed using both modified pedigree and bulk methods by INRAT in collaboration with ICARDA. It’s a selection from an advanced F9 line, FLIP2012 196L, which was derived from a cross of ILL590 (early-maturing genotype) with ILL8113 (drought tolerant). During the three consecutive cropping seasons (2014–2017), the increase in yield of ‘krib’ above that of the local checks was about 13 and 15% for ‘kef’ and ‘Boulifa’, respectively. ‘Krib’ is an early-flowering (on average ~ 93 d) and early-maturing (on average ~ 138 d) variety. It's therefore, the earliest variety among the previously released varieties. Its dehulled seed has a protein content of 26.8% which was above that of ‘Kef’ (23.9%). ‘Krib' showed good agronomic performance under drought conditions and large adaptation for the Tunisian environments. Tested as ILL11171, ‘Krib’ was approved for release and registered in the Tunisian Official Catalogue of Plant Varieties in 2019, based on the superior performance, by the DG/PCQPA, Tunisia. The availability of ‘Krib’ variety to farmers could increase lentil production and offers the producer aprofitable benefit in their cropping systems.