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Assessment and exploitation of indigenous genetic diversity is important for crop genetic improvement. Little is known about the diversity and divergence in cultivated and indigenous wild olives in Pakistan. We aimed to estimate the diversity and divergence between cultivated and wild olive collection from Buner, Bajaur, Malakand and Upper-Dir regions of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, based on 30 olive genotypes using eight Randomly Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD) primers. Polymorphic single bands were considered as a single allele/locus for all genetic analysis of these olive genotypes. A total of 36 loci were amplified, scored as dominant markers (present or absent). When considering 30 genotypes, all the markers were polymorphic. A minimum number of loci was recorded for OPA1B1, OPB2B1 and H20B1 while the maximum was recorded for OPA1B7 and OPR3B7. Maximum gene diversity 0.515 was recorded for loci OPA1B3 and OPR3B2, while the minimum gene diversity (0.067) was recorded for loci OPR3B7, OPB2B5, H07B4, H20B1, H20B2 and A14B2. An overall high diversity was observed within 30 olive individuals, each individual was a distinct multilocus genotype. The RAPD based FCA analyses revealed a clear divergence between the cultivated and wild genotypes collected from various locations of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Individuals sampled in Buner, Malakand and Bajaur were relatively closer to each other, than those sampled from Upper Dir. The divergence and diversity observed in the present study could be useful for exploitation of local and exotic olive genetic resources.

We would also like to acknowledge CIMMYT-USDA Pakistan office, particularly Dr. M. Imtiaz, and the WPEP research project, from the resources of which, at least a part of, this research work was financed.

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