More cassava for less time

Cassava has a relatively long growth cycle compared to other important crops. It takes an average of 10-12 months — sometimes up to 24 months! — for farmers to harvest the roots; maize, rice, and potato’s growth cycles span less than a third of that.

Dr. Michael Gomez Selvaraj and his colleagues at the CIAT Phenomics Platform are developing a technique that can identify the genes and factors that cause early bulking of roots, which can help establish how to shorten the growth cycle of cassava.