Registration of Urjii, Field Pea Variety for Bale Highlands, Ethiopia

Urjii (Acc. 32615-1) a semi-erect white seeded field pea variety has been selected and developed by Sinana Agricultural Research Center. The variety was released in 2007 for Bale highlands and similar agro-ecologies. This variety was tested in a regional variety trial in 12 environments, at four locations (Sinana, Sinja, Selka and Agarfa) in the highlands of Bale for three consecutive years (2003/04 to 2005/06). Due to its superior performance Urjii was selected and verified at four locations during bona 2006/07 cropping season and, there after, released for production. This variety is characterized by a white seed coat, with a high yield and yield advantage of 6.62% and 23.2% over the standard and local checks respectively. It is stable, adapts well, has a large number of pods per plant, thousand seed weight, and is moderately tolerant to powdery mildew, downey mildew and ascochyta blight