Finger millet [Eleusine coracana (L.) Gaertn.] is an important crop of the millets group
cultivated in terai and hills of Nepal. A total of 537 accessions of finger millet were
characterized during the years 2010 and 2012 at National Agriculture Genetic Resources
Centre (NAGRC), Khumaltar, Lalitpur, Nepal. Standard characterization descriptors were
used to record 12 quantitative and 7 qualitative characters. Different measures of variation
like mean, standard deviation, range, Shannon-Weaver diversity indices (H') were used for
the assessment of diversity between the accessions. Highest degree of diversity was
observed for number of leaves (0.906) followed by leaf sheath length (0.902), ear exertion
(0.901), blade length of flag leaf (0.893), leaf blade width (0.886), heading days (0.885),
plant height (0.879), leaf blade length (0.872), number of productive tillers (0.860), finger
length (0.841) and ear size (0.830). With the R2 value of 0.6, 14 clusters were observed
based on Euclidean's distance (quantitative traits) whereas with the R2 value of 0.8, 12
clusters were observed based on Gower's distance (quantitative and qualitative traits).
Three principle components explained 96.13% of the total variation in the collection. Ear
shape (0.99) is the most important variable in principle component 1.

Finger millet [Eleusine coracana (L.) Gaertn.] is an important crop of the millets group
cultivated in terai and hills of Nepal. A total of 537 accessions of finger millet were
characterized during the years 2010 and 2012 at National Agriculture Genetic Resources
Centre (NAGRC), Khumaltar, Lalitpur, Nepal. Standard characterization descriptors were
used to record 12 quantitative and 7 qualitative characters. Different measures of variation
like mean, standard deviation, range, Shannon-Weaver diversity indices (H') were used for
the assessment of diversity between the accessions. Highest degree of diversity was
observed for number of leaves (0.906) followed by leaf sheath length (0.902), ear exertion
(0.901), blade length of flag leaf (0.893), leaf blade width (0.886), heading days (0.885),
plant height (0.879), leaf blade length (0.872), number of productive tillers (0.860), finger
length (0.841) and ear size (0.830). With the R2 value of 0.6, 14 clusters were observed
based on Euclidean's distance (quantitative traits) whereas with the R2 value of 0.8, 12
clusters were observed based on Gower's distance (quantitative and qualitative traits).
Three principle components explained 96.13% of the total variation in the collection. Ear
shape (0.99) is the most important variable in principle component 1.