Article

Impact of Tillage Systems on Economics and System Productivity of Forage Crops-Wheat systems

Abstract

This investigation was conducted to determine the impact of tillage systems on sustainability and productivity of forage crops-wheat systems for three consecutive years at Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana. The six crops as cowpea (Vigna unguiculata), Pearl millet/ bajra (Pennisetum typhoides), maize (Zea mays), sorghum (Sorghum bicolor), guara (Cyamopsis tetragonoloba) and Teosinte/ makchari (Euchaleana maxicana) were grown under zero and conventional tillage followed by zero tilled wheat. The results revealed that ZT-ZT (80.18 q/ha) had the higher average system productivity as compared to CT-ZT system (78.83 q/ha), which was recorded 1.68 % more than CY-ZT system. Similarly, the average net return of Rs. 86588.00 was recorded maximum under ZT-ZT that was 2.9 % more as compared to CT-ZT tillage system (Rs. 84077.00). However, average system productivity was received highest under maize-wheat (90.61 q/ha) that was 11.40, 10.80, 14.82, 24.21 and 15.00 % higher than cowpea-wheat (80.28 q/ha), bajra-wheat (80.82 q/ha), sorghum-wheat (76.80 q/ha), guara-wheat (68.67 q/ha) and makchari-wheat (77.02 q/ha), respectively. The cropping system of maize-wheat gave the highest net return of Rs. 99980.50, which was 13.95, 13.22, 18.65, 2.62, and 18.35 % higher than cowpea wheat, bajra-wheat, sorghum-wheat, guara-wheat and makchari-wheat, respectively. The adoption of the cropping systems by the farmers mainly depends on the economic return, therefore, the findings of this investigation indicated that all the cropping systems can be grown successfully and efficiently with substantial returns without affecting the soil and environment due to the skipping of initial operations for seed bed preparations.

Key words: Forage crops-wheat systems, Net return, System productivity, Tillage systems