Productivity Assessment of Drought Tolerant Rice Cultivars under Different Crop Management Practices in Central Terai of Nepal
Abstract
Proper selections of resource conservation technologies and drought tolerant cultivars are being potential strategies determining productivity of rice in drought prone areas. Thus, a field experiment was accomplished in central - terai of Nepal during 2014 to assess the productivity of drought tolerant rice cultivars under different crop management practices. The experiment was carried out in strip -plot design with three replications consisting four drought tolerant rice cultivars and three crop management practices. The analyzed data revealed that SRI (System of Rice Intensification) produced significantly higher grain yield (5.28 t ha-1) than other management practices. The straw yield of SRI (5.12 t ha-1) was also significantly higher than othe r management practices. The cultivars had no influence on grain yield, but the straw yield was significantly influenced by cultivars, with the highest straw yield in Sukkha -3 (5.21 t ha-1). Thus, SRI management practice can be adopted as adaptation approac h for obtaining higher productivity in central terai and similar agro -climatic regions of Nepal.
Keywords
Download Options
Introduction
Rice is the second most important staple food for more than half of the world’s popu lation [1, 2]. Being a most important staple food of Nepalese people, rice ranks first crop for both acreage and production and production amounts to half of the total cereal grains in the country [3]. In Nepal, rice is grown in about 1.42 million hectares with total production about 4.50 million tons, and 3.17 t ha-1 productivity [4]. The share of agriculture and forestry for national gross domestic product (GDP) is 33.03%, and therein rice alone contributes 20.75% of the agriculture gross domestic product (AGDP) and 10.2% of total GDP [5].
In Nepal, more than 70% of the total rice area is grown under rainfed condition [6], whereas only 21 % rice production is under partially or fully irrigated conditions [7]. Rice production relies on ample water supply and thus is more vulnerable t o drought stress than other crop. T he temperature of Nepal has increased by 0.04 -0.06 ºC annually on an average during 1977 - 2005 [8]. Increase in temperature due to climate change has resulted an increase in evidences of drought stress in crop production including rice [9]. According to sta tistics, the percentage of drought affected lands areas more than doubled from the 1970s to the early 2000s worldwide [10]. Further, increased temperature may decrease rice potential yield up to 7.4% per degree increment of temperature [11]. Several other factors like weeds, low factor productivity and reducing resource use - efficiency due to deteriorating soil health are causing the lower productivity of rice in Nepal. Among various approaches to climate change adaptation in drought prone areas, proper sele ctions of resource conservation technologies like (SRI, ICM, etc.) [12] and drought tolerant rice cultivars [13] are potential strategies determining yield of rice. Thus, the present investigation is planned, executed and accomplished with the objective of pursuing the productivity of various drought tolerant rice cultivars under different crop management practices in central terai of Nepal .
Conclusion
The results showed that grain yield was significantly influenced by management practices, where SRI management practice recorded the highest grain yield than other management practices. But, the rice cultivars and the interaction of management practices and cultivars had no influence on grain yield. Thus, SRI management practice can be adopted as adaptation approach for obtaining higher grain yield in central terai and similar agro -climatic regions of Nepal.
