Objectives: The agro morphological diversity of Bambara nut remains poorly understood. In this study 90 Bambara nut accessions were assessed for phenotypic variability of agronomic and morphological traits.
Methodology and results: A trial was conducted at Rollo (Bam province) on 90 accessions of Bambara nut of 3 agro ecological zones in Burkina Faso. Accessions were evaluated on 27 morphological characters. Result of qualitative traits analysis showed dominance of cream-coloured seeds, butterfly-grey eyes, and smooth yellowish-brown pods. The majority of quantitative traits were discriminant at 1%. The completed PCA indicates that the first two axes expressed 55.60% of the total variability. The dendogram highlighted four groups of diversity.
Conclusion and application of results: The agro morphological characterization showed great variability
within the accessions studied. The different associations between yield components and the clustering into
classes could be exploited in breeding programs for improvement of Bambara nut productivity.

Bambara nut, agromorphological characters, Variability