Making Rainfed Agriculture Sustainable by Fodder Grass Strips: An Affordable technology for Soil Conservation and Soil Health

To make rainfed agriculture an economically viable enterprise for improving livelihood and welfare of farming community contributing around 40 percent of total food production in India, it is vital to implement best management practices to keep soils healthy, conserve agronomic inputs, minimize environmental impacts, and produce adequate yields. Increase in sudden down pour of rain invites high soil loss from the agricultural field leading to erosion of uppermost soil layer. Permanent fodder grass strips can be effective at checking nutrient removal and trapping sediment visa-a- vice meet the green fodder demand of small ruminants. However, Nutrients removed by erosion create a limitation to land productivity. It was being observed that grass system is useful for the improvement of other soil properties (soil physical and biological properties for example) related to soil erosion control, slope stabilization, and food production. Hence this study brought out the impact of grass strip based cropping system on sustainability of a rainfed farming. The field with grass strip improved in their soil quality from 0.39 to 0.52 in four years of time. This concept of growing grasses on both side of the field (in a strip of one meter) in loamy fine sand to sandy loam textured soils, improves soil health and significantly reduces runoff from the cropped field. A permanent belt of Brachiaria ruziziensis, two-meter width, was established at every fifteen meters across the direction of slope. This mechanization friendly technology provides sufficient green fodder for the small ruminants. Castor- Redgram rotation with fodder grass strips on upper and lower side of the slope fetched better crop productivity thus total returns increased from 1,37,022rupees/ ha to 1,78,689 rupees/ha. Use of grass strips is low-cost measures for soil conservation especially for slowing down run-off at sudden down pour with high intensity. Quantitative data on their impact on soil quality, productivity and economic viability of such systems are very little for the rainfed cropping system in semi-arid environment. This study may help researchers and its managers to help farmers with this low cost and viable technology.