Target population of environments for bean breeding in Africa

The target population of environments (TPE) approach aims at enhancing the effectiveness of crop improvement programs to achieve yield and/or genetic gains by helping to classify and prioritize regions based on stress patterns (frequency, onset, intensity and duration) and uses it to recommend improvement in the selection strategy. The beangrowing environments in Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Uganda can be categorized into six different environmental groups (EGs) on the basis of seasonal variation of drought stress under historical and future climates projected using crop-climate prediction models (Jha et al, under review). This brief is based on the results from that study.