CASI Adoption in Bihar for Smallholder Farmers- An Option or Future

Abstract

"Conservation agriculture (CA) evolved as a practice in response to concerns of sustainability of agriculture globally and also is a viable solution for Sustainable Intensification. The study was attempted to examine the profitability of CASI technology vis-à-vis traditional cultivation practices especially for direct Seeded Rice (DSR) and Zero Till (ZT) wheat. Primary data was collected from 120 sample farmers following a multi stage sampling technique. It was observed that 40.83 per cent farmers adopted either of the CASI technology. The level of adoption was found lowest among marginal and small farmers (18.87%) whereas most of the medium farmers (94.44%) and almost half of the semi medium farmers (44.90%) tried CASI at least in some portion of their field. CASI technology was mainly followed in cereal crops (paddy, wheat and maize). The grain and straw productivity with the adoption of CASI raised the gross income by 14.48, 18.75 and 19.70 per cent in rice, wheat and maize, respectively. CASI adopters on an average earned 53 paisa, 55 paisa and 1.34 rupee more than the net return obtained by conventional farmers over each rupee invested paddy, wheat and maize respectively. This was primarily due to the reduction in explicit cost items. Adoption of conservation agriculture technology can surely reduce the farmer’s costs of cultivation and also increase the farmer’s net income and thereby results in the betterment of standards of living."