Abstract
The application of chemical fertilizers is costly and gradually lead to the environmental problems. Natural farming is becoming an increasingly important aspect of environmentally sound sustainable agriculture. In this regard, an experiment was conducted during Maha season in 2014 from November to February at Vaharai DS Division, Batticaloa, Sri Lanka. The experiment consisted of two farming systems; natural farming and conventional farming and was laid out in a Randomized Complete Block Design with twelve replications. All the crop management practices from land preparation to harvesting were done for each farming systems separately. Bg 352 rice variety was used for the experiment. Growth parameters and yield parameters were taken at fourteen weeks after sowing by destructive random sampling method. The results revealed that natural farming system significantly (p<0.05) increased the tested parameters such as plant height, total number of tillers, total number of productive tillers, total leaf area per plant, root length, dry weight of root, Panicle length, total number of spikelets per panicle, number of filled spikelets per panicle, hundred grain weight along with yield over conventional farming system. Further, economic analysis of the data presented in this study showed that natural farming method for rice cultivation is the most economical and attractive option for farming community. The high yield grain and less cost of production per hectare were noted in natural farms (B/C= 4.82) as compared with conventional farms (B/C=2.39). Therefore, it could be concluded that the adoption of natural farming technology improves rice farmer’s profit along with livelihood and this eventually reduces poverty through environmental friendly way. KEYWORDS: Conventional farming, economic analysis, natural Farming, rice, yield
Highlights
The Sri Lankan national economy relies heavily on agriculture. 10.8 percent of Sri Lanka’s national GDP relies on agriculture itself (CBSL, 2013), especially the cultivation of rice
Using pesticides on crops is effective in reducing pests and weeds, and decreasing damages done to the rice crop, so Sri Lanka has become highly dependent on such pesticides
The plant height is not a yield component in grain crops but it indicates the influence of various nutrients on plant metabolism
Summary
The Sri Lankan national economy relies heavily on agriculture. 10.8 percent of Sri Lanka’s national GDP relies on agriculture itself (CBSL, 2013), especially the cultivation of rice. The Sri Lankan national economy relies heavily on agriculture. 10.8 percent of Sri Lanka’s national GDP relies on agriculture itself (CBSL, 2013), especially the cultivation of rice. Rice is immensely influential in the diets of Sri Lankans as 45% of the total calories and 40% of the total protein requirement is acquired through the consumption of rice. Because of intricacy of rice cultivation, many procedures are used on the crops to acquire the final product. This further leads to the use of chemicals, such as urea, which is the most popular form of nitrogen fertilizer (60-70%) used in Sri Lanka (NFS, 2012). Using pesticides on crops is effective in reducing pests and weeds, and decreasing damages done to the rice crop, so Sri Lanka has become highly dependent on such pesticides
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