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Harnessing the Potential of Jatropha and Pongamia Plantations for Improving Livelihoods and Rehabilitating Degraded Lands

OAR@ICRISAT

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Relation http://oar.icrisat.org/4716/
 
Title Harnessing the Potential of Jatropha and Pongamia Plantations for Improving Livelihoods and Rehabilitating Degraded Lands
 
Creator Wani, S P
Sreedevi, T K
Marimuthu, S
Rao, A V R K
Vineela, C
 
Subject Land degradation
Jatropha
 
Description Current increase in demand of knowledge for alternative sources to fossil fuel has triggered
lot of interest in use of non-edible oils as green knowledge source in de;eloped and developing
countries. ICRISAT is adopting pro-poor bio-fuel strategy to benefit vulnerable sections of the
society through development of degraded common property resources and individual lands
which are not suitable for food production by adopting consortium approach. Research and
development options for harnessing the potential of Jatropha and Pongamia are undertaken
to increase productivity of Jatropha and Pongamia plantations. Large vmiability in the
accessions of Jatropha and Pongamia was observed for total oil content varying from 27.4%
to 40.6% in case of Jatropha and from 21 to 41 % in case of Pongamia. These accessions
are evaluated for different agronomic characters along with yield potential under rain-fed
conditions at ICRISAT, Patancheru, India. Application of nitrogen and phosphorus at different
levels .indicated that during the 4'h year harvest index (pod to seed ratio) varied from 53-56%
with different fertilizer treatment. The plant yield of Jatropha within an accession with 3x2
spacing varied upto 1.4 to 1.6 kg ha per plant (2.3 to 2.7 t ho" under rainfed conditions).Water use efficiency of three years old Jatropha plantations indicated that evapo-transpiration
demand under no moisture stress for Jatropha varied from 1150-1350 mm per yem. Under
the semi-arid tropical conditions Jatropha is able to use water relatively 40-57% of nonstress
situation. Intercropping with Jatropha and Pongamia plantations is feasible and even
during 4'h year in pruned Jatropha plantations with yield of different crops varying from 0.29
t ho" in case of green gram to 1.5 t ha" for sorghum. Intercrops like sorghum, pearimillet,
pigeon pea, soybean, mung bean, chickpea, sunflower, safflower with Jatropha and pearl
millet and pigeon pea with Pongamia could be successfully grown. An additional income of
Rs.5,000 to Rs.16,OOO per ha can be obtained on low-quality (but reasonably able to support
crop growth) soil.Nutrient budgeting approach can -be used successfully to work aut nutrients requirement
needed to achieve targeted yields in crop like Jatropha_ Fallen leaves quantity and nutrient
content of Jatropha varied with plant age and fertility treatment and contained 9500 mg N
kg" which is lowest amongst different plant parts such as shoots and seeds as well as deoiled
seed cake_ One year plantation returned 16 kg N ha,l and three-year plantation returned 21
kg N ha" through fallen leaves_ The fallen leaves also added 1 000 kg ha" organic C to soil
in addition to carbon fixed in seeds which will replace fossil fuel C De-oiled seed cake after
extracting necessary oil can be used as plant nutrient source on the farmers' fields, Benefits
of oil seed cake application in terms of increased yields of maize, cotton and other crops
were higher than N applied through mineral fertilizer source.
 
Date 2009
 
Type Conference or Workshop Item
PeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Language en
 
Rights —
 
Identifier http://oar.icrisat.org/4716/1/HARNES_SING_THE_POTENTIAL_O__JATROPHA.pdf
Wani, S P and Sreedevi, T K and Marimuthu, S and Rao, A V R K and Vineela, C (2009) Harnessing the Potential of Jatropha and Pongamia Plantations for Improving Livelihoods and Rehabilitating Degraded Lands. In: 6th International Biofuels Conference, 4-5 March 2009, New Delhi, India.