Book of Extended summaries ISDA

International Conference on Reimagining Rainfed Agro-ecosystems: Challenges &
Opportunities during 22-24, December 2022 at ICAR-CRIDA, Hyderabad
T5-03O-1210
Real Time Monitoring and Management of Drought in Groundnut
Sahadeva Reddy, A. Malliswara Reddy, K. Ashok Kumar, K.V.S. Sudheer,
C. Radha Kumari, C. Yasmin, Ch. Murali Krishna, S. N. Malleswari and
G. Ravindra Chary
AICRP for Dryland Agriculture, Agricultural Research Station,
Acharya N G Ranga Agricultural University, Ananthapuramu-515001, Andhra Pradesh
Rainfed agriculture is likely to be more vulnerable to climate change because of its high
dependency on monsoon and the chances of increased extreme weather events like delayed
onset of monsoon, high intensity rainfall (wet spells), seasonal drought, early withdrawal of
monsoon etc. due to aberrant behaviour of south-west (SW) monsoon. Almost 56 per cent of
cropped area in Andhra Pradesh is under rainfed conditions where crop yields are largely
influenced by the vagaries of the weather. Ananthapuramu region in the southern part of
Andhra Pradesh is the driest part of the state, climatically classified as arid zone and receives
an annual precipitation of 553 mm against the atmospheric water demand (PET) of 2128 mm.
Despite such precarious conditions, the area under groundnut is increasing and at present it is
being cultivated in an extent of 5.0 lakh ha. Among the abiotic stresses, drought (moisture
stress) is the major factor influencing the yield of rainfed crops. Variation in crop yields is more
in dry lands due to the nonreceipt of timely rainfall and prolonged dry spells during crop
periods. Monsoon failures results in drought which has serious implications for small and
marginal farmers and livelihoods of the rural poor. Any contingency measure, either
technology related (land, soil, water, crop) or institutional and policy based, which is
implemented based on real time weather pattern (including extreme events) in any crop
growing season is considered as real time contingency planning. Hence, this experiment on
real time drought monitoring and management was planned for adapting to current climate
risks and will help in getting higher yields.
Methodology
Field experiments were conducted at AICRPDA, Agricultural Research Station,
Ananthapuramu (latitude of 14°41′ N, longitude of 77°40′ E and altitude of 350 meters above
mean sea level) during kharif from 2019 to 2021 in rainfed Alfisols. The two treatments
consist of Real time drought management (RTDM) with proven contingency measures during
early, mid-season, terminal drought and rainfed (control) in groundnut (VarietyK6). Each
treatment was laid out in an area of 1000 m 2 . The initial soil fertility was low in organic carbon
(0.20%), low in available nitrogen (140 kg ha -1 ), high in available phosphorous (107 kg ha -1 )
and low in available potassium (98 kg ha -1 ). Under RTDM in groundnut subsoiling @ 1m
distance before sowing once in two years (2019 and 2021), formation of conservation furrows
Emerging approaches (RS, AI, ML, Drones etc) for crop management &assessment
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