Cassava is a basic food staple of poor families in Brazil and it is common for them to have backyard patches of cassava plants from which they dig roots for daily use. This is particularly true in houses lying on the outskirts of most small towns in the State of São Paulo, Brazil. A survey for new table cassava types was being carried out in 126 counties of this State, inspecting 5 to 10 patches adjacent to residences on the outlying parts of each county seat, when the Santa Barbara mycoplasma disease showed to be present in 12 out of the 126 counties. This disease occurred mostly in the counties near Aguas de Santa Bárbara, the city where the disease was first recorded. In the other 114 counties no mycoplasma disease was noticed. Control measures such as propagation of cuttings only from healthy plants have provided good control of other types of cassava mycoplasma disease in large commercial plantings in the past. It is thought, however, the eradication of the Santa Bárbara type of mycoplasma disease from cassava backyard patches is difficult to accomplish because the owners do not care for selecting healthy planting material and eliminating sick plants.
cassava; mycoplasma; Santa Bárbara mycoplasma disease; occurrence; distribution