Cropping System Influences the Wheat Productivity, Profitability and Quality in Alluvial Soils
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Authors
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Tanuja Poonia
ICAR- Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, Karnal
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MANOJ KUMAR GORA
ICAR- Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, Karnal
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MK Kakraliya
ICAR- Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, Karnal
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HS Jat
ICAR- Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, Karnal
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PC Sharma
ICAR- Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, Karnal
Keywords:
Conservation Agriculture, Management practices, Crop yield, Net returns, Wheat grain qualityAbstract
Wheat is an important food crop and is essential to ensure food security of India. The northwest (NW) Indo-Gangetic Plains of India (IGP) is the food bowl of the country and dominated by rice-wheat system. Conventional tillage-based wheat system with intensive tillage operations, unscientific management and open field burning of rice residue led to high production costs, decreased crop yields with lowered net returns. Therefore, a field experiment was conducted to evaluate the effect of cropping system and their management practices on wheat yields, water use, net returns and grain quality at slightly alkaline site of ICAR- Central Soil Salinity Research Institute (CSSRI) experimental farm Karnal, India. Five scenarios varied in cropping system and their agronomic management were included; Sc1- conventional tillage (CT) wheat without residue (-R); Sc2- zero tillage wheat (ZTW) on flats with full rice residue (+R); Sc3- wheat on permanent beds (PBs) with partial maize residue (+R); Sc4- wheat on PBs with partial soybean residue (+R); Sc5- wheat on PBs with partial pigeon pea residue (+R). Scenario 2-5 were managed on the principles of conservation agriculture (CA). All the CA-based management practices (Sc2 to Sc5) significantly improved the crop yields (~20%) and net returns (~33%), saved irrigation water (~19%), and enhanced the quality parameters of wheat as compared to farmer practice (Sc1) irrespective of ZT flats and PBs. Based on 2 years mean, PBs systems improved the wheat yields by 23%, net returns by 38% and saved irrigation water by 23% which helped in improving the irrigation water productivity by ~60% compared to farmers’ practice (Sc1). Results showed that integration of CA-based management practices with diversified cropping system improved the wheat yield and also helped in improving the resource (water) use efficiency and grain quality in the NW India. The maize-wheat-green gram and pigeon pea-wheat- green gram system were found at par and suitable for improving the wheat yields in NW India.
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References
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