Local and introduced food legumes in the sub-tropical zone on Japan
1994
Nakano, H. (Tropical Agriculture Research Center, Ishigaki, Okinawa (Japan). Okinawa Branch)
In Japan, only Okinawa, is situated in the sub-tropics where high temperature and drought in summer as well as the frequent occurrence of plant diseases and insect damage are serious constraints on crop production. It was considered that germplasm of crops tolerant to these conditions should be present on the island and explorations for the collection of germplasm were organized three times from 1990 to 1992 on the Yaeyama islands in Okinawa. However, the cultivation of most of the local varieties of soybean and groundnut (Temperate zone legumes) and mungbean (a tropical legume) was discontinued thirty years ago due to their replacement with sugarcane that is the main cash crop of Okinawa. As for vegetable legumes, although hyacinth bean and yard long bean could be occasionally detected, pigeon pea was no longer cultivated. Therefore the TARC Okinawa Branch attempted to introduce vegetable legumes suitable for the taste of the Japanese people, in order to alleviate the shortage of temperate zone vegetables in summer in Okinawa. The first variety of winged bean introduced from Malaysia was released in Japan in 1991 after breeding. Germplasm of drought-tolerant bambarra groundnut which has been recently introduced from Indonesia, Zambia and Nigeria and of heat-tolerant snap bean from Malaysia and Thailand is currently being evaluated
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