Ocimum americanum L., known as hoary
basil, is an important wild herbaceous plant of Lamiaceae. In addition to being used as food and medicine, O. americanum has signifcant potential for
agricultural purposes, particularly in seed conservation. In the current context of climate change and the
rapid degradation of the environment, wild species
are endangered. Understanding the level and organization of agromorphological variability of these species is a key step toward sustainable management of
their genetic resources. This study was carried out to
assess the agromorphological variability of O. americanum. Seventy-nine accessions of hoary basil from
Burkina Faso were characterized based on 14 quantitative traits and 12 qualitative traits. The experimental
design consisted of Fisher’s blocks with three replications. Only three qualitative traits revealed variability within the whole collection with a low Shannon
diversity value of 0.29 for each trait. Therefore, all
the quantitative traits revealed variability within the
accessions of O. americanum. Cluster analysis led to four groups of accessions based on leaf and stem size,
and plant cycle. The frst group was identifed to be
more interesting than the other three groups regarding its agronomical potentialities. The fndings of
this study may be valuable for the development of
descriptors and breeding programs

Hoary basil · O. americanum · Genetic resources · Agromorphological variability · Descriptors