Book of Extended summaries ISDA

International Conference on Reimagining Rainfed Agro-ecosystems: Challenges &
Opportunities during 22-24, December 2022 at ICAR-CRIDA, Hyderabad
T6-23P-1182
Evaluation of Suitable Cropping Sequence for Dry Tracts in Prakasam
District of Andhra Pradesh
L. Rajesh Chowdary, S. Bharathi and G. Subba Rao
Agricultural Research Station Darsi, Prakasam, Andhra Pradesh
ars.darsi@angrau.ac.in
Proper use of the vital natural resources influences the existence of life systems and socioeconomic
development of any country. Land suitability evaluation is the process of
estimating the potential of land for land use planning (Sys et al. 1991). Continuous growing
of same crop on the same field cause deficiency of a particular nutrient in the soil due to
continuous removal of a specific nutrient from a specific depth of the soil, also cause
dominance of a particular insect or disease or weed in crop because of continuous available
favourable conditions and host plant which leads severe reduction in crop yield. Since long,
conventional cropping of rice under medium to heavy textured soils under bore wells and
single crop of pigeonpea or fallow. Bengal gram or single crop of bajra/foxtail millet in light
textured soils under rainfed conditions is being followed in most of the areas of Prakasam
district. However, each plant species requires specific soil and climatic conditions for its
optimum growth. Information on crop sequence suitability in dry tracts of Prakasam district
in particular and in Andhra Pradesh in general is very much scanty. In India, it is observed
that the area and production of millets has decreased and this might be due to lack of
remunerative prices, timely marketing facilities and hence diversifying to commercial crops
like cotton, chillies, maize and maize-based cropping systems. To achieve sustainable
production in terms of ecological, economical and biological sustainability millet-based
cropping systems can be followed (Chandra et al., 2013). Millets are mainly cultivated as
single crop during Kharif in Prakasam district under rainfed conditions with minimum
management and the fields are left fallow during Rabi. Hence, an attempt has been made to
evaluate the suitable millet-based cropping sequence in dry tracts of Prakasam district,
Andhra Pradesh to utilize the available resources and improve the socio- economic status of
dry land farmers.
Methodology
Agricultural Research Station, Darsi is located in between 14 o 57′ and 16 o 17′ North latitude
and 78 o 43′ and 80 o 25′ East longitude. The climate is semi-arid with distinct summer, winter
and rainy seasons. The field experiment was conducted for two consecutive years at
Agricultural Research Station, Darsi during 2017-18 and 2018-19. The soil at the
experimental site in sandy loam in texture and low in organic carbon content (0.20%). The
experiment was laid out in Randomized Block Design with three replications. The
experiment comprised of nine treatments (foxtail millet-bengalgram, foxtail millet -cowpea,
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