Resource Management Domains of Kharif and Rabi Season Fallows in Central Plateau Region of India: A Strategy For Accelerated Agricultural Development - Resource Management Domains of Kharif and Rabi Season Fallows in Central Plateau Region of India: A Strategy For Accelerated Agricultural Development - Open Access Pub

Over last few decades, acreage of total fallow lands (Kharif and Rabi seasons) in India has remained almost unchanged around 25Mha. The acreage of Kharif (summer) and Rabi (winter) Fallows in Madhya Pradesh (MP) are 1.98Mha and 5.51Mha, respectively. In the semi-arid agroclimatic zones of the states, Fallow-Wheat/Gram/Indian-Mustard cropping systems are practiced. After harvest of Kharif rice, kodo-kutki, maize or sorghum, farmers generally practice post-rainy season Rabi fallows in the sub-humid regions, south of Narmada River. Kharif fallowing is largely the result of the inability of the farmers to make planting dates independent of monsoon forecasts, and make efficient use of rain water. It appears that factors responsible for Kharif and Rabi fallows are distinctly different and a general consequence of distinctly different soil moisture regimes prevailing in the two crop seasons. Kharif and Rabi fallows have two distinct resource management domains. Whereas, Kharif fallows can be tackled with “PMP-dry seeding” agronomy, production constraints of Rabi fallows can be substantively tackled by shifting from tilled to zero-till agriculture with residue management to make efficient use of the conserved rain water. Some irrigation support will prove useful to tackle mid-season droughts in both situations. Conservation agricultural practices can significantly improve and stabilize crop yields in black soils and other associated soils of in the semi-arid tropics region of the Central India. DOI10.14302/issn.2639-3166.jar-19-2590 Since 1960s, India has pursued an agricultural policy aimed largely at enhancing productivity through input based approaches. This strategy resulted in substantial gains in crop production and productivity to overcome recurring food shortages in the country. The strategy however, has ignored the impact of input interventions on the soil health and the associated ecoservices, resulting in declining factor productivity and widespread problems of natural resource degradation 1. Such gains were generally limited to well-endowed regions where it was possible to alter the production environment through input use. This has raised some serious questions on the suitability of the past approaches considered for achieving the food security goals. Sustainable agriculture requires land based solutions for management of natural resources, which integrates biophysical and socioeconomic parameters for characterizing the land management units, known as resource management domains. A resource management domain is a homogenous land unit having similar