Agro-Economic Performance of Crop Diversification in Rice Based Cropping Systems of Northwest Bangladesh

Abstract

Among the winter (Rabi) crops, wheat is one of the most important temperature-sensitive crops and is the second most important grain crop after rice in Bangladesh. An experiment was conducted in research field of Wheat Research Centre, Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute, Dinajpur, Bangladesh with 5 different cropping patterns including wheat and transplanted (T) Aman rice, and a non-wheat cropping pattern started from Rabi of 2008-09 to Kharif II of 2012 to evaluate the agronomic and economic performance of the patterns in the light soil of northwestern part of Bangladesh. Wheat-Jute-T.Aman Rice cropping pattern gave comparable gross margin with higher benefit-cost ratio (BCR) but need lower total variable cost. Lower gross return and gross margin were obtained from cropping pattern Wheat-T.Aus Rice-T.Aman Rice. Cropping pattern Wheat-Mungbean-T.Aman Rice produced higher gross return and gross margin than the cropping pattern Wheat-T.Aus Rice-T.Aman Rice. Cropping pattern Potato-Wheat-Maize-T.Aman Rice produced higher wheat equivalent yield in all the 4 years. Cropping pattern Wheat-T.Aus Rice-T.Aman Rice produced lower wheat equivalent yield than other cropping patterns and also induced acidity rapidly. Cropping pattern Wheat-Mungbean-T.Aman Rice needed lowest cost but gave economic benefit with comparable BCR.