A five years study on the selection of rice based cropping systems in Goa, for west coast region of India

Abstract

Aim : Methodology : Results : Interpretation : Field experiments were conducted for five years during 2010-11 to 2014-15 to select productive and profitable rice based cropping systems forWest coast region of India at ICAR-Central Coastal Agricultural Research Institute, Goa. Cropping systems . rice-cowpea, rice-groundnut, rice-brinjal and rice-sweet corn were tested for their production potential, economic feasibility, nutrient balance and energy budgeting along with rice-fallow as control. The data indicated significantly higher rice equivalent yield (23.5 t ha ) with rice-sweet corn followed by rice-brinjal (14.1 t ha ) as compared to a predominant rice-fallow system of the region (5.50 t ha ). Higher potential usable residue was also found higher with rice- sweet corn system (36.9 t ha ). Results of the energy ratio (46.5), specific energy (0.65 MJ kg ) and energy productivity (1.52 kg MJ ) indicate that the rice-sweet corn is most energy efficient system among all the evaluated systems. Although, rice-brinjal system depicted higher onfarm employment potential (217 man days ha year ) with an increase of 317%over monocropping, while the economic analysis indicted higher net return ( . 95350) and benefit cost ratio (2.57) in rice-sweet corn system. The nutrient balance were positive for N and P, while in all the cropping systems the Kbalance was found negative. The rice-sweet corn system was found to be the most productive, economical and energy efficient cropping system for theWest coast region of India under protective irrigated conditions.