IDENTIFICATION OF ELITE LOCAL ACCESSIONS OF ROSELLE (HIBISCUS SABDARIFFA) BASED ON MORPHO- PHENOLOGICAL TRAITS

In Côte d\'Ivoire, the available data on the diversity and genetic structuring of Guinea sorrel remain limited and not very popularized, thus making research work and varietal improvement efforts particularly difficult. To overcome this problem, a survey carried out in 12 localities has made it possible to have an in-situ collection of 80 accessions. Twenty-nine (29) accessions from this collection were evaluated in this study. The objective was to identify elite accessions, potentially candidates for an improvement program. Nineteen (19) quantitative traits were analyzed on a Fisher block device. Descriptive analysis revealed a high morphological variability between accessions. The coefficient of variation showed a strong heterogeneity between accessions for certain traits. The Principal Component Analysis revealed 70.07% of the total variability. The classification made it possible to distinguish three groups of accessions according to their similarity. The classification by the k-means method made it possible to classify accessions into three groups and to identify the most efficient ones according to the stages of development. Thus, the accessions HSKO 037, HSFE 031, HSBK 004 and Bangolo stood out respectively at the 2-leaf, vegetative, flowering, and fruiting stages by presenting the highest values for the traits evaluated.