Abstract
The study was undertaken with the objective to examine the nature and to quantify the magnitude of genotype x environment interaction effects on soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] grain yield and to determine the winning genotype (s) for test environments in north western Ethiopia. The experiment was executed at four different locations of Ethiopia for two consecutive years (2007 and 2008) using thirty two genotypes including two checks. Randomized complete block design with three replicates was employed. The combined analysis of variance over environments explained soybean grain yield was significantly (p<0.001) affected by environments (25.58%), genotypes (14.87%) and genotype x environment interaction (59.55%). The result depicted differential performance of soybean genotypes at different test environments and hence the interaction was crossover type. The genotype main effect plus genotype x environment interaction (GGE) biplots were applied to analyze and visualize pattern of the interaction component. The first two principal components (PC1 and PC2) of the GGE explained 63.4% with PC1=41.6 and PC2=21.8 of the GGE sum of squares using environment standardized model. Genotypes, G13 (TGX-1998-29F), G3 (TGX-849-313D), and G7 (TGX-1889-29F) combined both high mean yield and high stability performance across the test environments and could be characterized as an ideal genotypes. Key words: Glycine max, genotype plus genotype x environment interaction (GGE), Ethiopia, stability, yield.
Highlights
Soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] is the world’s leading source of oil (20%) and protein (40%)
The national programme overlooked the effect of genotype x environment (GE) interaction and the concept of stability and it capitalizes on varieties with only good mean performance across a wide array of environments and years
The GE explained about 59.55% of the variation which is more than double of the environmental and four times of the genotypic effects of the total variation
Summary
Soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] is the world’s leading source of oil (20%) and protein (40%). It is produced in a wide range of environments around the world. The crop was introduced in to Ethiopia in the 1950 and it has been growing in different agro-ecologies of the country. Its production has not yet spread over compared to the country’s potential. It is mainly constrained by lack of improved and stable varieties suited for different growing ecologies in the country and lack of popularization and market linkages (Asfaw et al, 2006). The GE interaction effect is, most often, a common phenomenon in a multi-environment yield trail and presents limitations on variety selection and recommendation for target environments, and must be either exploited by selecting superior genotype for each specific target environment or avoided by selecting widely adapted and stable genotype across
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