Designing profitable, resource use efficient and environmentally sound cereal based systems for the Western Indo-Gangetic plains
In the western Indo-Gangetic plains, issues of deterioration in soil, water, and environment quality coupled with low profitability jeopardize the sustainability of the dominant rice-wheat (RW) system. To address these issues, crop diversification and conservation agriculture (CA)-based management h...
| Authors: | ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; |
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| Format: | Article |
| Status: | Published version |
| Publication date: | 2020 |
| Country: | México |
| Institution: | CIMMYT |
| Repository: | Repositorio Institucional de Publicaciones Multimedia del CIMMYT |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:repository.cimmyt.org:10883/21068 |
| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10883/21068 |
| Access Level: | Open access |
| Keyword: | AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES AND BIOTECHNOLOGY SUSTAINABILITY CROPPING SYSTEMS CONSERVATION AGRICULTURE |
| Summary: | In the western Indo-Gangetic plains, issues of deterioration in soil, water, and environment quality coupled with low profitability jeopardize the sustainability of the dominant rice-wheat (RW) system. To address these issues, crop diversification and conservation agriculture (CA)-based management hold considerable promise but the adoption of both approaches has been low, and additional evidence generation from a multi-criteria productivity and sustainability perspective is likely required to help drive the change. Compared to prevailing farmers' practice (FP), results suggest that CA-based rice management increased profitability by 13% and energy use efficiency (EUE) by 21% while reducing irrigation by 19% and global warming potential (GWP) by 28%. By substituting CA-based maize for rice, similar mean profitability gains were realized (16%) but transformative improvements in irrigation (-84%), EUE (+231%), and GWP (-95%) were observed compared to FP. Inclusion of mungbean in the rotation (i.e. maize-wheat-mungbean) with CA-based management increased the system productivity, profitability, and EUE by 11, 25 and 103%, respectively while decreasing irrigation water use by 64% and GWP by 106% compared to FP. Despite considerable benefits from the CA-based maize-wheat system, adoption of maize is not widespread due to uneven market demand and assured price guarantees for rice. |
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