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R7540 `promotion of Chickpea Following Rainfed Rice in the BARInd Area of Bangladesh’

Dr J Kumar
ICRISAT, Patancheru, Andhra Pradesh 502324, India

PROVA
GPO Box No. 15 , Dingadoba, Rajshahi - 6000, Bangladesh

BARI (OFRD & PRC),On-Farm Research Division,Joydebpur, Gazipur, Banglades

Abstract/ Executive Summary:

There is great potential for improving the livelihoods of poor farmers in the High Barind Tract (HBT) area of Bangladesh by growing chickpea on residual soil moisture after the harvest of rainfed rainy season (aman) rice. The area, covering about 2,200 km², was traditionally left fallow after the single crop of aman rice, mainly because of the lack of irrigation potential and the hard-setting nature of the soils. Technology to permit crop establishment after rice and growth on residual soil moisture and winter rain was developed in the 1980s and implemented over the subsequent decade. Chickpea has proved to be a particularly suitable crop in this system and its area in the region has increased ten-fold from a base of around 1,000 ha in the 1980s. However, constraints to wider adoption of chickpea are: low yields due to use of inappropriate varieties; an inefficient seed supply system; insufficient knowledge by farmers of chickpea production and storage techniques; poor nodulation and nutrient deficiencies of soils in some areas; difficulties in obtaining good crop establishment as top soil dries rapidly at the end of the rice season. On-farm trials during 1998/99 demonstrated that priming chickpea seed overnight with water before sowing improved crop establishment and plant vigour, gave a 47% increase in grain yield and reduced the risk of crop failure by half. This simple, low-cost, low-risk ‘key technology makes chickpea a much more attractive crop for farmers to grow. This project was aimed to address the purpose, pathways for the potential equitable uptake of technologies from PSP outputs 2-6 identified, piloted and promoted. The project has evaluated seed priming i.e. overnight soaking of seed in water prior to sowing, as a means of increasing grain yields and as a vehicle for expanding chickpea area. Multilocation, farmer-managed evaluation of priming response was conducted at many locations across the HBT over four years (1998-2002). Mean response to priming in grain yield ranged from 22 to 48% with responses inversely proportional to winter rainfall. Priming also reduced seedling disease incidence and increased plant population, early growth vigor, plant biomass and nodulation by native rhizobia. Farmers readily adopted the simple priming technology to the extent that at least one quarter of the chickpea sown in 2001 was primed. Along with priming technology, improved varieties of chickpea such as Barichola 2 or 5, and appropriate fertilizer practice e.g. phosphorus fertilizer, were introduced.

Keywords: Chickpea, Residual, Soil moisture

Location: In Bangladesh

Start Date:

End Date:

Program Area: Crop-Soil-Water Management

Commodity: Chickpea, Soil Moisture

Objectives:

To determine the R7540 `Promotion of Chickpea following rainfed rice in the Barind area of Bangladesh’

Methodology:

Methods to optimize cropping systems by agronomic means developed, tested, piloted and promoted. There is great potential for improving the livelihoods of poor farmers in the High Barind Tract area of Bangladesh by growing chickpea on residual soil moisture after the harvest of rainfed rainy season (aman) rice. Chickpea has proved to be a particularly suitable crop in this system and its area in the region has increased ten-fold from a base of around 1,000 ha in the 1980s. However, there are constraints to wider adoption of chickpea and the most important one being difficulties in obtaining good crop establishment as top soil dries rapidly at the end of the rice season. On-farm trials during 1998/99 demonstrated that priming chickpea seed overnight with water before sowing improved crop establishment and plant vigour, gave a 47% increase in grain yield and reduced the risk of crop failure by half. This simple, low-cost, low-risk ‘key’ technology makes chickpea a much more attractive crop for farmers to grow. The project will, using on-farm participatory methods, confirm over several seasons and in diverse agroecological conditions the beneficial effects of priming chickpea. Widespread adoption of chickpea will be stimulated and supported and the influence of a ‘key’ technology(seed priming) on farmers’ perception of risk and likely benefits and the effect on farmers’ livelihoods will be quantified. Focused Informal Research and Development (FIRD) will be tested for promoting this knowledge-based technology. This information will be of interest to researchers and extensionists working in other crops and production systems. Additional participatory research, development and training will refine and improve chickpea production technology appropriate to Barind farmers. Through seed production, dissemination and demonstration activities, an annual compound increase in area of 20% is envisaged, along with an increase in yields to a regional average of around 1 t ha-1 by three years. Thus, after three years of project operation, a doubling of chickpea production in the region is expected.

Source of Information: FINAL TECHNICAL REPORT, BARI (OFRD & PRC), On-Farm Research Division, Joydebpur, Gazipur, Bangladesh

Article Link (Online Journal):

Funding Source:

1.

Budget:

Total Budget (Tk.) :

Achievement/Findings:

Among both rainfed (e,g linseed) and irrigated (e.g boro rice, wheat) rabi crops, rainfed chickpea proved to be the most profitable crop at most locations surveyed (except one location where yields of all rainfed crops were very low). This was due to both low input costs (c.f. high input costs for irrigated crops) and high and increasing prices of chickpea grain (which are showing a continually increasing trend due to short supply of chickpea in Bangladesh). In the almost rainless Rabi season of 2001-02, farmers could realize up to Tk 16,000/- per ha profit from chickpea cultivation on owned land and up to Tk 9,000/- per ha from leased land or by share cropping. Rural household economies of the HBT are dominated by rice cultivation, which is progressively becoming less remunerative, even with availability of irrigation. Thus crop diversification, particularly to high value rainfed crops with minimal input requirements, represents an important avenue for poverty alleviation in the region. Farmers are readily adopting the simple seed priming technology along with improved chickpea varieties and other optimum cultivation practices. This low-cost, simple priming technology has indeed been used as a vehicle to introduce other improvements in chickpea production in the region, such as insect pest management and seed storage techniques. An adoption and impact analysis of the project assessed the effects of project intervention on livelihoods of the rural community in the HBT (Saha 2002). The high and annually increasing prices of chickpea grain suggest that increased cultivation of this crop would significantly improve livelihoods in the region; reasonable yields (>1 t/ha) are currently more remunerative than irrigated boro (winter) rice or wheat (these irrigated cereals have high yields but inevitable high input costs).

Knowledge Management: Journal