<div style="text-align: justify;">Homestead farming has been the backbone agricultural economy of Kerala but the &nbsp;productivity of the homesteads in Kerala has yet to reach an &nbsp;acceptable &nbsp;level. In this paper the possibility of increasing the contribution of this sector through proper crop planning is sought. The optimum model was developed by using linear programming (LP) technique. The constraints included in the analysis were total area, intercropped area, investment amount and population of each enterprise. The optimum model reveal the scope of 22.83 per cent enhancement in net return as compared to net return from the existing plan. Sensitivity analysis of the optimum model revealed that further enhancement of net return in The agro-ecological region could be achieved by increasing the cropping intensity in the underutilized intercropped area and changing the binding enterprises.</div>

Determination of optimum crop mix for crop cultivation in Kerala homesteads

<div>Background: Bangladesh is one of the densely populated countries in the world. To meet up the increasing food demand there&rsquo;s no alternative to increase the cropping intensity through high yielding and short duration crop varieties. Currently, cropping system of Bangladesh is mostly rice based which is also the staple food. Therefore, farmers which follow rice-rice based cropping patterns are gaining less profit day by day. Contrary, intensive rice culture is depleting soil properties gradually. Thus, to preserve soil health and increase profit pulse and oil seed based cropping patterns are crucial for sustaining a cropping pattern. This study was undertaken to find out a cropping pattern with higher yield and profit in the context of Magura district. 
 
Methods: Five cropping patterns, CP1 = Transplanted Aman rice (cv. Binadhan-7)- Mustard (cv. Binasarisha-9)- Boro rice (cv. Binadhan-14); CP2 = T.Aman (cv. Binadhan-16)-Mustard (cv. Binasarisha-10)- Boro (cv. Binadhan-14); CP3 = T.Aman (cv. Binadhan-17) -Mustard (cv. Binasarisha-10)- Boro (cv. Binadhan-14); CP4 = T.Aman (cv. Binadhan-17)-&nbsp;Lentil (cv. Binamasur-8)- Sesame (cv. Binatil-3) and &nbsp;CP5 (Control) -&nbsp;Aman (cv. Shorna) &ndash; Boro (cv. Heera) - fallow were assessed to identify the most suitable and profitable pattern as well as to enhance the cropping intensity by adding a pulse or oil seed crop between two rice crops. The investigation was conducted at farmer&rsquo;s field of Magura during 2018-19. Block farming method was followed for experiment set up.&nbsp; 
 
Result: It was revealed that, maximum rice equivalent yield (REY) was obtained from CP1 (14.46 t/ha) followed by CP4 (13.52 t/ha), CP3 (13.35 t/ha), CP2 (13.09 t/ha) and CP5 (11.33 t/ha) during one year crop cycle. Highest gross margin (Tk. 1,90,189) and MBCR (1.83) was obtained from the cropping pattern CP4 and the lowest gross margin (Tk. 69,271) and MBCR (1.24) was found with the pattern CP5. Based on the above results it can be suggested that, Aman rice-Lentil-Sesame pattern i.e. CP4 may be a best choice for the farmers of Magura region for the maximum utilization of their land and gaining more profit compared to the other studied cropping patterns.</div>

<div>Yield and Profitability Analysis of Pulse and Oil Seed Based Cropping Patterns against Aman- Boro- Fallow Cropping Systems in Magura</div>

<div>There have not been sufficient studies on Sen cropping patterns, a system of planting several food crops in one planting hole. A study to examine the effectiveness of minimum tillage on the Sen cropping pattern, concerning the soil quality improvements and their effects on crop productivity, was conducted on a field plot. The tillage treatment consisted of minimum planting with planting hole sizes of 20x20x20 cm, 30x30x20 cm and 40x40x20 cm, including one control planting hole. A total of 36 planting holes were tested. Improvement of soil physical-chemical properties was measured by comparing the measurements results at initial soil conditions and at 14 days after planting. The results showed that the 20x20x20 cm hole treatment was able to improve the physical-chemical quality of the soil with the best value compared to other treatments. The optimum improvement of soil quality to increase plant productivity was achieved at 40x40x20 cm hole treatment.</div>

Improvement of Soil Quality through Minimum Tillage for Sen Cropping Pattern in Indonesia

<div style="text-align:justify">The present investigation was undertaken to work out the economic performance and optimum cropping pattern based on alternative price scenarios in Arid-Western Plain Zone of Rajasthan state. In the present study, the unit-level cost of cultivation data of various crops for the triennium ending year 2013-14 which were collected from &ldquo;Comprehensive Scheme to Study the Cost of Cultivation of Principal Crops in Rajasthan state. The performance of different crops was assessed by calculating net returns under three alternative price scenarios i.e. (i) Market prices (MP) (ii) Economic prices (EP) and (iii) Net income based on natural resource valuation technique (NRV). This study has considered subsidy as a cost to society. Similarly green house gas emissions from the crops have been taken as cost to the society and nitrogen fixation by leguminous crops have been taken as gain to the society. Results from the study shows that groundnut-barley combination of crop sequence was found the most remunerative in economic return generated over the year of `59418 per hectare followed by groundnut-vegetables (`53930/ha) and groundnut-gram (`52879/ha) combinations. Net gain to the farmers based on the alternative price scenarios viz. market, economic and natural resource valuation prices were estimated as `114.38 lakh, `114.45 lakh and `138.82 lakh, respectively. The overall gain to society has increased at economic prices by `49.39 lakh whereas it was decreased by `93.24 lakh at natural resource valuation due to the lack of cultivation of legume crops. The optimal plan is suggested that more area under cultivation of legume crops like groundnut, clusterbean and gram because of they are less water intensive and more environment friendly and thus have a positive impact on natural resource valuation with the existing water availability.</div>

<div style="text-align: justify;">Economic Performance and Optimum Cropping Patternbased on Alternative Price Scenarios in Arid-Western Plain Zone of Rajasthan State</div>

Background: Bundelkhand region of India consist of 14 districts, evenly divided between southern Uttar Pradesh and northern Madhya Pradesh states representing 2.42% of India&rsquo;s total geographical area with a high percentage of barren and uncultivable land. The region is highly vulnerable and susceptible to climatic hazards. Wheat, chickpea sorghum, paddy, maize, barley, lentils, sesame, mustard, groundnut, soybean, peas and beans are the major crops grown in the region. In the context of climate change, noticeable shifts in cropping patterns have been observed. This study aims to analyse these patterns and assess the extent of change over time. 
 
Methods: The dynamics of cropping patterns in the Bundelkhand region of India were analysed using secondary data collected from published reports of the Directorate of Economics and Statistics (DES), Government of India from a period to 2002-03 to 2021-22 (i.e. 20 years). The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) was employed to capture long-term growth trends. Furthermore, seasonal temporal changes in the cropping pattern of the region were captured by a Transition Probability Matrix (TPM). 
 
Result: Results of the analysis indicated a significant change in the cropping pattern over the period, with kharif crops experiencing a strong growth at CAGR of 5.54%, rabi crops at CAGR 2.02% and substantial growth in pulse area at CAGR of 1.96%. Significant temporal shifts in cropping patterns during the kharif season were observed in the Bundelkhand region. Among the kharif crops, urdbean crop registered highest and significant CAGR of 10.90%. Similarly, area expansion under mungbean, pigeon pea, paddy, sesame, groundnut and soybean registered substantial area expansion, while the area under maize remained almost stagnant at 38 thousand ha over the period of time. Traditionally grown coarse cereals such as sorghum and small millets have witnessed a drastic reduction in area coverage in the region. The TPM analysis revealed the higher probability of area retention among cereal crops (wheat (0.89) and paddy (0.54) and pulse crops (urdbean (0.67), lentil (0.71), mungbean (0.55), chickpea (0.87) and field pea (0.70), while millets had a higher probability of losing their area. The government needs to promote climate-suitable crops to reduce water scarcity and related risks, which can ultimately lead to India&rsquo;s self-sufficiency in pulses in Bundelkhand region.

Transition in Cropping Patterns: Evidence from Bundelkhand Region of India

<div>Background:&nbsp;Conventional monoculture or cereal-cereal sequence systems insist farmers to use excessive application of chemical fertilizer in agriculture resulting reduce the soil organic matter contents and structures. The inclusion of green manuring crops in a rotation is vital to improve the biochemical and physical properties of the soil via increasing the labile of organic matter and ultimately increased crops yield. Some complex molecules of green manuring crops takes a longer time of decomposition and thus nutrients reserve in soil and release latter which provide nutrients to the succeeding and following crops. So the current experiment aimed to study the residual effect of different in situ green manuring crops to the sub-sequent and following soil. 
 
Methods: The field experiment conducted during 2015 to 2016 with eight green manuring crops and rice and mustard was the subsequent and following crop. In situ incorporation of GM crops with 100% (F1) and 50% (F2) fertilizer, the prior and post-harvest soil (cropping pattern) of experiment field (0-15 cm) was collected and analyzed. 
 
Result: After two consecutive year, GM-T.aman-Mustard cropping pattern increased soil organic matter 0.04% to 0.07% and 0.02% to 0.03% (T1 and T2 with F1 and F2) and nitogen 0.05% (T1, T2 and T7 with F1 and F2) and K 0.2 to 0.5 meq/100 g (M. pudica with F1 and F2) and P 2 ppm to 15 ppm (T1, T2, T3 and T7 with F1 and F2) compared to initial soil. Rice yield with T1, T2, T3 and T6 shown higher with both fertilizer doses. Nitrogen fertilizer rates could be reduced after the incorporation of green manures in the succeeding and following crops.</div>

Residual Effect of Green Manure on Soil Properties in Green Manure-Transplant Aman-Mustard Cropping Pattern

<div style="text-align: justify;">In Assam, most of the crops are grown with productivity that is lower than the potential yield. Potential utilization of irrigation is not much encouraging in the state. Besides, most of the farmers are marginal and small farmers leading to low mechanization in Assam agriculture. Therefore, a proper crop planning is needed that would help the farmers to select crops for mechanization under assured irrigation that will give them higher profit. The study has been under taken with the objective to develop optimum crop planing for better resource use efficiency, sustainability and maximizing farm net income across production environments by using linear programming (LP) through GAMS (General Algebraic Modeling System). The resulted optimum crop model showed that, the areas under almost all the major crops grown in Assam have the scope to be increased under the land constraint of the state both in existing and improved irrigated situation and to contribute more in farm income. From the result of the study, it can be concluded that, besides rice, crops like maize, sugarcane, jute, mustard, pea and vegetables like tomato, brinjal, cauliflower, chilies etc can be seen as potential crops in a profitable crop plan for the state.</div>

<div style="text-align:justify">Optimum Crop Planning for Better Resource use Efficiency, Sustainability and Maximizing Farm Net Income in Assam</div>

<div>Background: Over the centuries many revolutions have happened, lot of innovations took place, several discoveries changed the way the world would have been, these may be credited to discovery of paper, compass, steel, steam engine, anti-biotics, lenses, transistors, electricity, or computer. Civilizations have evolved but, in every era, agriculture played a major role in fueling the prosperity of the nation and establishing its growth. Agriculture in India provides livelihood to almost about 60% of India&rsquo;s population. Percentage contribution of agriculture and allied sectors in gross value added for India at present prices stood at 17.8% in 2020. Investment through consumer in India should grow in 2021, post losses due to COVID-19 contraction. Food sector in India is set for huge growth owing to its immense potential for diversity and value addition. Food processing sectors contributes approximately 32% of total market share, supposedly one of biggest sectors and stands fifth in terms of production, consumption, export and expected growth. 
 
Methods: Farming as a sector is a vulnerable investment owing to dependency on diversified geographical locations, environmental conditions and pest attacks, it is of prime importance to devise technological assisted methods to monitor and provide early remedial actions for the damage and infections to the crop. Work proposed is an effort to increase the yield a farmer would otherwise have; system implements the recommender system assisted by sensor data and weather conditions prevailing to suggest ideal crops to be sown for the region. Model acquires data: moisture content, rainfall estimated, NPK content of soil, temperature conditions and Ph value of the soil in addition to climatic conditions of the region for recommending the suitable crop. 
 
Result: Model proposed estimated the required parameters employing calibrated sensors from a maize farm and climatic conditions from government weather prediction platform, crop gave us a small window of six months from June to November to conduct the experiment, site selected was at Safedabad, Lucknow (U.P.) and classification was achieved through random forest algorithm trained on labeled dataset which achieved an accuracy of 96%, the testing data when fed to the model gave output with an accuracy of 93%.</div>

Expert Recommender System for Mapping Optimum Crop Type

<div>Background: Freshwater in sufficient quantity and adequate quality is a prerequisite for human societies and natural ecosystems. To adequately feed 9.3 billion people in 2050, consumptive water use (i.e. transpired water) by all food and fodder crops needs to increase from its present estimated level of 7000 km3/year to 12,586 km3/year. However, fresh water resources are increasingly getting scarce because of increased competition among a multitude of users. Getting agriculture to perform with progressively smaller allocation of renewable water resources will remain a challenge on global scale. To meet the challenge there is an urgent need to improve the crop water productivity to ensure the sustainability of agriculture. 
 
Methods: An experiment was carried out at village Menawali, Hanumangarh, Rajasthan during both kharif and rabi seasons to assess productivity, economics, N-uptake and water use of different crops. An area of 187 ha comprising 25 farmers irrigated by common irrigation channels were selected to collect the information. The information required i.e. soil, crop management, growth, phonological, yields, water balance, N-uptake and water use efficiency of each crops were collected from 15 farmers. Bt-cotton and clusterbean of kharif and wheat and Indian mustard in rabi were prominent crops, cotton-wheat, cotton-mustard, clusterbean-wheat and clusterbean-mustard were major cropping sequences of the study region. 
 
Result: In kharif season, Bt-cotton gave higher economic yields than clusterbean and amongst rabi season crops, economic yields of wheat and mustard were 4255, 1778 kg/ha, respectively. The economic yield of cropping sequences varied from 3741-6514 kg/ha and were higher for cotton-wheat (6218 kg/ha), intermediate for clusterbean-wheat (5785 kg/ha) and lower for cotton-mustard (3741 kg/ha) and clusterbean-mustard (3308 kg/ha). The cotton-wheat (₹1181.2 mm) sequence had highest water use. Clusterbean-wheat cropping system recorded highest water productivity (16.5 kg/ha mm) followed by clusterbean-mustard (14.9 kg/ha mm). The clusterbean-mustard (₹456/ha mm) cropping sequence was most profitable and fetched highest net return followed by clusterbean-wheat (₹383/ha mm).</div>

Assessing Crop and Water Productivity Performance of Different Crops and Cropping Systems

Background: A two-year field study was conducted at the ICRISAT research farm during the rainy seasons of 2021 and 2022 to investigate the impact of crop geometry, crop establishment method and sustainable nutrient management practices on nutrient availability pattern and growth of hybrid pigeon pea. 
 
Methods: The experiment followed a split-split plot design. The collected data was analysed using radar graph and heat maps for nutrient availability and dry matter respectively. 
 
Result: Data revealing that transplanted plots registered higher nutrient availability and proportionate root and total dry matter production at various growth stages. Among plant geometry the root and total dry matter production was higher with 100&times;100 cm. when considering planting methods, transplanting with a square system of 100&times;100 cm, combined with an integrated nutrient management approach consisting of 150% (or) 100% soil test based NPK, vermicompost at a rate of 5 t ha-1, phosphate-solubilizing bacteria (PSB) and seed treatment with Rhizobium, resulted in average of 31.5% higher dry matter production over alone inorganic nutrient management practices. Thus, a square geometry of 100&times;100 cm, along with sustainable integrated nutrient management (100% soil test based NPK, vermicompost at a rate of 5 t ha-1, PSB and seed treatment with Rhizobium), resulted in higher nutrient availability and dry matter production. These findings highlight the importance of careful selection of planting methods, crop geometry and nutrient management practices for maximizing the nutrient mining for production of high dry matter production of hybrid pigeonpea.

Bio-inoculated Nutrient Management Influence on Soil Nutrient Availability Pattern and Growth of Hybrid Pigeonpea (ICPH 2740) under Establishment Methods and Crop Geometry