PERSPECTIVES OF SOYBEAN BASED CROPPING SYSTEMS IN INDIA: A REVIEW

S. SANBAGAVALLI¹*, S.D. BILLORE², J.R. KANNAN BAPU³, J. EJILANE⁴, S. MARIMUTHU⁵, K. GANESAN^6
1Department of Pulses, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003, India
²ICAR - Indian institute of Soybean Research, Indore, Madhya Pradesh, 452001, India
³Department of Pulses, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003, India
⁴Department of Pulses, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003, India
⁵Department of Agronomy, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003, India
⁶Department of Sustainable Organic Agriculture, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003, India
* Corresponding Author : sanbagavallitnau@gmail.com

Received : 06-12-2016     Accepted : 21-12-2016     Published : 28-12-2016
Volume : 8     Issue : 63       Pages : 3578 - 3585
Int J Agr Sci 8.63 (2016):3578-3585

Keywords : Soybean, intercropping, Sequence cropping, Soil fertility, Potential yield
Academic Editor : Dr Eleonora Nistor
Conflict of Interest : None declared
Acknowledgements/Funding : None declared
Author Contribution : None declared

World population is growing exponentially and it has to fulfill their food requirements and other side degradation of cultivable land, natural resources and competition for land from modern urbanization and industrialization limit that horizontal expansion of cultivable land. An alternate strategy for increasing productivity and labour utilization per unit area of available land through vertical expansion by intensive agriculture viz., intercropping, sequential cropping on time and space dimension. The intensive systems are well known and have been increasing the production potential per unit area and insuring against total crop failure under aberrant weather conditions and also can improve and maintain soil fertility. Soybean (Glycine max L.) belongs to the legume family is known as the “Golden Bean or a Miracle crop” of the twentieth century. It is a very energy rich grain legume containing 38-40 per cent protein and 18-20 per cent oil in the seeds. Soybean has been cultivated as a monocrop that leads to establishment of harmful dominated weed flora and high infestation of insect-pests, which significantly reduces the yield of soybean. In such a situation, diversification of cropping system is necessary to get higher yield, net returns, maintain soil health, preserve environment and meet daily food and fodder requirement of human and animals. The practices of intercropping explore efficient utilization of all given and available resources, which maintain stability in production and obtain higher net returns accordingly, which is not possible through sole cropping system. This paper provides an overall view and evaluation of cropping systems with soybean, summarizing its main advantages supported by a number of key examples from the literature, which point out its great value in the context of sustainable agriculture.