*Genetic Conservation and Importance of Ginger in Ethiopia DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.103072*


*Numbers are mean and SD of four replicates (four plant in each culture jars). Means followed by the same letter within a column are not significantly different by Tukey's test at* α *= 0.05%. Source: [11].*

#### **Table 3.**

*Antibiotics treatment of plant material results in shoots free from R. solanacearum.*

(tetracycline and streptomycin) reduced the contaminants thereby increase the survival rate of the plantlets.

#### *2.6.2 Ginger biotechnology*

Consistent and increasing demand for clean planting material from improved cultivars of ginger is persistent. Providing the required through indigenous techniques of propagation is incompetent owing to inefficient production and transmission of disease. In this regard, to evaluate the potential of shoot tips and axillary buds and to determine the appropriate growth regulators for propagation In vitro was attempted in two ginger cultivars [12]. From the study, it is reported that the better shoot multiplication of average for each explant was 7 shoots after culturing for 6 weeks attained on BA (2 mg/l) and kinetin (1 mg/l) with a huge significant difference in observation between explant source and growth regulator used. Successful root induction (8.75) in 4 weeks of culture and well acclimatization and field survival were noticed in the plantlets generated. Berihu [13] reported on disinfection of ginger sprout buds and disease screening with tests that have resulted in disease-free plantlets of ginger through mass propagation and commercialization to customers. A Series of washing steps with CuSO4 with Tween 20 with different time intervals and flashing with sterile water has resulted in effective disinfection. Biochemical examination and serological test via NCM-ELISA for cleaning of disease in vitro and mass propagation of ginger for samples tried and yielded successful raising ginger sample. Another study on In vitro micropropagation of shoot tip explants by Selam *et al*. [14] using Ethiopian ginger cultivar to overcome the

*Genetic Conservation and Importance of Ginger in Ethiopia DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.103072*

problem of unclean and unhealthy ginger planting material is published late. The wilt disease due to *Ralstonia solanacearum* Biovar 3 Race 4 has resulted in obtaining masses of profuse planting materials free from disease. The study aims at revealing the effect of three sterilization agents namely RBK (0.25% w/v), NaOCl (0.50% v/v) and ethanol (70% v/v) in mixture with HgCl2 (0.25%). Study of efficacy for 4 antibiotics (broad-spectrum) in combination to control contaminants of bacteria with shoot tip explants of ginger and the effect of antibiotics performance on the shooting of explants of cultivar have been studied. Live explants (70%) with 80% free from contamination were obtained after 3 weeks of incubation from 20 min exposure to 0.50% v/v NaOCl continued by 0.25% HgCl2. Of all the combinations tried the highest (7.10 ± 0.36 and 7.51 ± 0.27, respectively) mean micro shoots per explant and mean length of shoot (4.2 and 3.56 cm) were obtained at cefotaxime (50 mg/l) and cefotaxime with streptomycin (25 mg/l). The results presented in this study could provide some basic foundation for optimizing protocols in sterilizing explants and can effectively control the bacterial contaminants in ginger cultivar for large-scale micropropagation [15].
