Introduction
Cassava, Manihot esculenta Crantz, is an important
starchy staple of the lowland tropics and a mainstay of
some of the most hard-pressed populations of the world,
food security-wise. The crop accounts for over 60% of
the daily calorie intake of some 500 million people in the
sub-Saharan region of Africa (FAO 1997) and is irreplaceable
in this part of the world as a food-security
crop. It is therefore ironical the paucity of genetic studies
aimed at improving the efficiency of cassava cultivation.
The number of years required for the evaluation of