Contribution of components of production on snap bean yield

aiming to estimate the path coefficients among morphological traits and effects of production components on the yield of grains and pods, thirty snap bean genotypes (27 lines and three commercial controls) were evaluated in bom jesus of itabapoana-rj. the experiments were carried out in a randomized block design, with four replications, from may to june, in 2009 and 2010. eight traits were evaluated and the number of pods per plant, associated with high genetic correlation, is the character with the most significant direct effect on productivity. there is a high rate of genotypic association between the yields of pods and grains, as well as direct effects of high magnitude and positive signal between them, indicating that the selection for increased pod yield allows increased grain yield.