This research was conducted to overcome the problem of slow and erratic emergence in okra and to find out the effects of priming on germination, growth performance and yield in okra at Research Field of Nepal Polytechnic Institute (NPI) Bharatpur-11, Chitwan, Nepal (April-July, 2019). Arka Anamika variety was used for experiment. The experiment was laid out in Randomize Complete Block Design with 5 treatments and 4 replications, i.e. T1 (hormonal priming with IBA), T2 (hydro priming with fresh tap water), T3 (halo priming with NaCl), T4 (chemo priming with liquid urea) and T5 (un-primed seeds). Field experiment results showed that priming proved effective in improving germination percent except the chemo priming, reducing the mean germination time (MGT), improving the growth parameters (plant height, number of branches, plant canopy and number of leaves) and improving yield contributing characters like fruit length, fruit diameter as compared to un-primed seeds. The highest and lowest germination percentages were found in hydro priming and hormonal priming respectively while better growth performance in hormonal and chemo priming. Similarly, hormonal and hydro priming resulted in higher yield. Hence, it is suggested that seed priming is important to improve the overall germination, growth performance and yield in okra.

Ethiopia is considered as the possible origin and center of diversity for okra. Therefore, this study was conducted with the objectives of determining the genetic distance between indigenous okra collections and exotic commercial varieties and assessing genetic diversity of okra genotypes. The field experiment was conducted at Dire Dawa in 2016 using 14 indigenous collections and 11 exotic varieties in 5 x 5 triple lattice design. Data were collected on 9 and 29 qualitative and quantitative traits, respectively. The genetic distance measured by Euclidean distance ranged from 3.1 to 12.6 with a mean of 7.2. The highest genetic distances were observed between indigenous okra collections and exotic varieties viz. Guba-12 and NamdHari (12.6) followed by Guba-12 and Vellayani (12.3) and Mythri and Guba-12 (11.8). Dendrogram constructed by Unweighted Pair-group Method with Arithmetic Means grouped the 25 genotypes into seven major clusters in which the three clusters (Cluster II, III and V) were solitary, consisted of one genotype each, Cluster I consisted of six Indian commercial varieties, Cluster IV comprised of seven genotypes (four indigenous okra collections, one variety from USA and two from India), while Cluster VI and VII comprised of 5 and 4 indigenous okra collections, respectively. This study revealed the presence of wide genetic diversity among indigenous okra collections and exotic commercial varieties.