Avaliação vegetativa de cultivares de coffea arabica L. no brejo paraibano.

Abstract

Coffee cultivation around the world, more specifically Arabica coffee, dates back thousands of years and has a remarkable history of sociocultural and political influences from civilizations around the world. In Brazil, has made it a global economic powerhouse in this category, given that it was widely spread throughout the country, even concentrated in some regions, reaching even the Northeast, where more specifically in Brejo Paraibano, great performance was achieved, albeit for a short time, due to the devastating action of the Cerococcus parahybensis pest, which completely wiped out coffee production in the region and almost extinguished the species there. It was revived in 2017 with the support of the Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB) and national development agencies, and has developed extensively, overcoming the old barrier caused by failures in technical expertise and technological support. As a result, an experiment was implemented in which the analyses aim to comparatively evaluate the vegetative characteristics of 32 of the varieties planted in a two-year experiment since transplantation, in which the parameters evaluated were plant height (AP), stem diameter (DC), crown diameter (DCo), number of plagiotropic branches (NRP), and leaf area (AF). It is extremely important to catalog this data in order to consider the environmental influence, the inclusion of new materials in the region, and the integration of their adaptability and qualitative productive response factors, even though, in this study, production data were not cataloged, and this point was only speculated upon as an interpretive basis. The experimental plot was arranged in three randomized blocks with three replicates each, where the spacing between plants was 70 cm and between rows was 3 m. In the results, obtained using the “R studio” software, it was noticed that the parameters that obtained statistical significance were plant height, crown diameter, and number of plagiotropic branches, with the Guará cultivar being the tallest, and IAC 125 RN and Catiguá being the shortest in height. the Mundo Novo 379-19 cultivar had the largest crown diameter and Catucaí Vermelho had the smallest crown diameter, and the cultivar that obtained the highest number of branches was MGS Turmalina, knowing that, in this case, all results were statistically similar even though they were significant. These data are in line with the literature, given that the plantation is considered young and the data are not yet fully conclusive.