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Title Characterizing the cereal systems and identifying the potential of conservation agriculture in South Asia
 
Names Krishna, V.V.
Mehrotra, M.B.
Teufel, N.
Bishnoi, D.K.
Date Issued 2012 (iso8601)
Abstract Conservation agriculture (CA) and related resource conserving technologies (RCTs) potentially offer a way to sustainably increase the agricultural productivity in developing countries. These practices, which involve minimal soil disturbance, residue retention and crop rotations, can potentially help farmers increase crop yields and reduce the costs of production. The present paper includes the major findings of a set of village level surveys aiming at the characterization of the cropping systems in the Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP) with a special focus on the potential entry points for CA-related technologies. The study area comprises of four regions in the IGP, namely Indian Punjab, Haryana, Central Nepal Terai and northwest (NW) Bangladesh. The village surveys were conducted in three districts from each of these regions, which were selected based on the prevailing cropping systems. From each of the selected districts, three sub-district units (blocks in India, Village Development Committees in Nepal and Union Councils in Bangladesh) were chosen randomly from a set of blocks with project intervention. Finally, one intervention village (for the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia project or CSISA) and one non-intervention (control) village were selected from each of these units. In this way, data from 72 villages were collected through focus group discussions (FGDs) conducted from April-May 2010. The tools used to gather information for the present study were FGDs and village census. The IGP has traditionally been the major grain producer of South Asia. On the one hand, the NW Plains, including Indian states of Punjab and Haryana, have a relatively favorable rice-wheat environment, dominated by wheat and irrigated rice. On the other hand, the eastern IGP regions, including the Nepal Terai and Bangladesh, have a less favorable rice-wheat environment, dominated by rainfed rice and partially irrigated wheat. Significant intra-regional differences with respect to resource endowments and incidence of poverty also exist. The NW Plains have a higher level of resource endowment and lower incidence of income poverty as compared to the eastern IGP. The cropping pattern in all the study regions consists primarily of rice and wheat. In addition, some farmers grow cotton and sugarcane in Haryana and Punjab. The cropping pattern of Central Nepal Terai is more diverse compared to the NW India, with significant share of acreage under vegetables, legumes and oilseeds. Among cereals, rice is more prominent than wheat and other cereals (e.g. finger millet and maize) are also cultivated. In NW Bangladesh, rice is cultivated in all the three cropping seasons while wheat and maize are cultivated on a limited scale. The landholding size is larger in Punjab and Haryana compared to Nepal and Bangladesh. A significantly larger proportion of landless households is engaged in non-farm activities. Land tenure systems also differ widely across the regions. In Punjab and Haryana, it is the relatively large farmers, with average landholding of 5-6 acres, who are engaged in leasing-in of land for cereal production, thereby utilizing economies of scale. On the contrary, marginal and small farmers and the landless are leasing-in land for cultivation in NW Bangladesh. In Central Nepal very few farmers were found to lease-in land for cultivation. This difference in land ownership is of critical importance as the existing land tenure system in the eastern plains could indicate greater livelihood vulnerability, making the farmers more exposed to risks and averse to the adoption of new agricultural practices including the CA-based RCTs. As part of the characterization of production systems, details of livestock production were collected in both FGDs and village census. According to the village census, nearly all the farming households in India’s NW states maintain dairy animals, while this figure is just around 50% in Central Nepal and NW Bangladesh. The considerable importance of dairy animals is also reflected in the herd sizes relative to available farm land. Fodder crops are only grown in NW India and even there the proportion is limited. Crop residues are the major source of fodder for all livestock in the investigated villages.
Genre Book
Access Condition Open Access
Identifier 978-607-8263-10-3