By TC Sood
If India’s pulses productivity has to rise sufficiently to meet
the nation’s demand for pulses, then one route is to increase
the amount of land used for cultivating pulses. In India, farming
is mostly a pattern driven by the onset and intensity of the monsoon,
and the timing of the kharif and rabi crops. Without diverging too
much from this pattern, it is possible to increase the amount of land
under pulses by having farmers and agriculturists move to short duration
and improved varieties under irrigated conditions. The farming community
can also increase productivity through adoption of improved technology
on a much larger area.
The Department of Agriculture and Cooperation (DAC) has proposed
a strategy for increasing production and productivity of pulses
that involves a thrust on non-conventional cropping systems, such
as:
Intercropping:
Inter-cropping of arhar, moong and urd with jowar, bajra, maize,
cotton, groundnut, soybean, etc.
Pulses as rabi crops:
Introduction of short duration arhar varieties into irrigated cropping
system in northern and central India in sequence with wheat;
Introduction of rabi arhar in Bihar, West Bengal, Orissa, eastern
Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh.
Introduction of rabi rajmash in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa, Madhya
Pradesh, Maharashtra and West Bengal.
Pulses in rice fallow areas:
Introduction of rabi pulses in rice fallow areas in southern states
with residual moisture.
Shift to pulses from other crops:
Replacement of high water duty crops by low water intensive crops
like pulses in command areas in order to make irrigation water available
at critical stages of crop growth through effective water scheduling.
Substitution of upland crops like rice, jowar, maize, bajra and
diverting these areas under short duration pulses in eastern and
southern states.
Pulses as summer crops:
Introduction of summer pulses (urd, moong, cowpea) in irrigated
areas after the harvest of rabi crops.
Introduction of moong and urd in fields vacated by potato, mustard,
sugarcane and wheat in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh,
Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh
Source: DAC note on National Pulses Development Project (NPDP)
and Integrated Scheme Of Oilseeds, Pulses, Oilpalm & Maize(ISOPOM)
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