Abstract

In 2013, the multi-location trial was implemented to evaluate the new soybean genotypes for their agronomic performance against the local check. The experiment was conducted in three locations namely Ilonga, Kibaha, and Mlingano in each location a triplicated trial involving six genotypes of soybeans were implemented. The effects of genotype, location and genotype x environment interaction under combined analysis on agronomic yield, and soybean yield were found significant at P<0.05. The highest mean yield was found from TGX 1954-1Fand TGX 1908-8F in all locations. Correlations coefficient for seed yield revealed a positive and significant association with all agronomic yield except 100 seed weight in all locations. The phenotypic coefficient of variation and genotypic coefficient of variation estimates were significantly high for pods per plants (49.49/27.04), while crude protein had the lowest values (1.45/0.98). The finding also revealed that the differences between phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) and genetic coefficient of variation (GCV) were significantly lower for crude protein (0.45), followed by pod length (1.45) and 100 seed weight (2.6). The result suggests that the environment had less effect on the expression of these traits. Therefore, selection based on these traits might increase soybeans performance in all locations. The findings have demonstrated the stability of traits in different locations which is a useful information in soybean breeding programs. TGX 194-1F and TGX 1908-8F were genotypes with high crude protein content, and revealed stable performance across the three environments. TGX 1987-10F, TGX 1987-20F and TGX 1910-14F had better performance compared to Bossier.

Key words: Soybeans, genotype, yield component, yield.