Agronomic, economic, social and environmental benefits of improved nutrient management practices in maize production systems under variable farm size, climate, soil fertility conditions and farmer resource endowment in Telangana, India.
A study was undertaken with the scientists of PJTSAU considering the following objectives. 1. To determine farmer typologies through implementation of rapid rural surveys in maize growing ecologies of Telangana. 2. To determine the impact of farmer resource availability on native soil fertility in variable maize growing environment 3. To determine the agronomic and economic impact of nutrient management in smallholder maize systems under contrasting tillage situations using ex-ante and on-farm assessment using Nutrient Expert 4. To provide options for maize intensification in different farmer typologies through Nutrient Expert based Site Specific Nutrient Management strategies 5. To train NARS, NAES, and industry partners in the application of NE to develop site-specific precision nutrient management recommendations suitable for all farm typologies in the study domain.
IPNI-2015-IND-532
2017 Annual Interpretive Summary
This study was aimed at understanding the maize-growing ecology in the state of Telangana, and to determine the benefits of improved nutrient management practices for maize production. The study covered two traditional (Karimnagar and Medak) and two emerging (Nizamabad and Mahabubnagar) maize-growing districts in the State.
In Karimnagar, maize was grown on an irrigated fertile soil (mixture of loamy and black cotton soils), where 70 and 50% of farmers apply organic manure and potassium (K) fertilizer to maize, respectively. The prevailing maize yields varied from 6.3 to 10 t/ha. In the Medak district, soils varied from loamy red earth to red sandy and black cotton soils, and maize is grown under rain-fed condition with only 10% of farmers applying both manure and K fertilizers, and maize yields range from 2.5 to 7 t/ha. Maize is grown under an irrigated condition in the Nizamabad district with loamy black cotton soil, and the yield varies from 6 to 7.5 t/ha. The average NPK application in this district was 343 kg/ha, and 70% of the farmers use manure while 100% of them apply K fertilizer. In Mahabubnagar district, maize was grown in red soils under rain-fed conditions and only 10% of the farmers apply both manure and K fertilizer. The average NPK application rate is 308 kg/ha and yields ranged from 1.2 to 6.3 t/ha.
The Nutrient Expert® (NE) fertilizer decision support tool and soil test crop response (STCR) equation-based fertilizer recommendations were considered as improved nutrient management strategies, which were compared with state recommendation (SR) and farmers' practice (FP). Ten on-farm experiments were conducted in each district comparing all the four nutrient management options. Average results of all the four districts indicated that highest maize yields were achieved with STCR (5.8 t/ha), SR (5.7 t/ha), and NE (5.4 t/ha) were not significantly different, but were higher than FP (4.9 t/ha). The 7% higher yield in STCR was a result of 24% higher nutrient application rates (248, 59, and 68 kg/ha N, P2O5, and K2O), than in the NE-based nutrient application (167, 60, and 56 kg/ha N, P2O5, and K2O). Among the four nutrient management options tested, NE-based site-specific 4R fertilizer recommendation showed a Benefit:Cost ratio of 8.1, which was 43, 26, and 29% higher than STCR, SR, and FP, respectively, indicating that even though yields achieved with NE-based fertilizer recommendations were slightly lower than STCR and SR, the economic benefit achieved with NE was significantly greater than STCR and SR. The project was concluded in 2017.