Best Crop Rotation Selection with GIS-AHP Technique Using Soil Nutrient Variability

Chiranjit Singha, Kishore Chandra Swain and Sanjay Kumar Swain
Additional contact information
Chiranjit Singha: Department of Agricultural Engineering, Institute of Agriculture, Visva-Bharati, Sriniketan, Birbhum, West Bengal 731236, India
Kishore Chandra Swain: Department of Agricultural Engineering, Institute of Agriculture, Visva-Bharati, Sriniketan, Birbhum, West Bengal 731236, India
Sanjay Kumar Swain: Department of Agricultural Engineering, Institute of Agriculture, Visva-Bharati, Sriniketan, Birbhum, West Bengal 731236, India

Agriculture, 2020, vol. 10, issue 6, 1-18

Abstract: Crop selections and rotations are very important in optimising land and labour productivities, enhancing higher cropping intensities, producing better crop yield. A land suitability analysis system based on the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) technique coupled with the Geographic Information System (GIS) software environment can be a unique tool for better crop selection. The AHP-GIS technique was used in land suitability analysis in crop rotation decisions, for rice-jute ( Kharif season) and potato-lentil ( Rabi season) crops in the Hooghly District, West Bengal, India. The study area covering 291 ha was classified based on eight major soil nutrient levels with 70 randomly selected plots for soil sampling and analysis. The soil nutrient variability was examined with descriptive statistics followed by best semivariogram-based model selection for kriging interpolation in the ‘R’ software environment. The pairwise comparison matrix based ranking of parameters and giving weights was carried out considering the importance of each parameter for specific crops. The total area, being under the major rice-potato belt, could be classified from the suitability view point to the ‘highly suitable’(S 1 ) class occupying 29.2%, and ‘not suitable’ (N) class; 4.5% for rice, about 6.5% of land is ‘highly suitable’ (S 1 ), ‘and nearly 2.1% area is ‘not suitable’ (N) for jute; and 21.3% is ‘highly suitable’ (S 1 ) for potato and 12.4% for lentil crops. The yield maps showed nearly 75% and 90% of the area for rice and potato crops, respectively, gave sound crop yield. Furthermore, the GIS platform was used for crop rotation analysis to spread multiple seasons ensuring better crop management in long run. Overall, 25% of the rice crop area for jute in Kharif and 8% of potato crop area for lentil in the Rabi season were recommended as replacements.

Keywords: land suitability; rice and potato; semivariogram; kriging interpolation; pairwise comparison (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/10/6/213/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/10/6/213/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jagris:v:10:y:2020:i:6:p:213-:d:368985

Access Statistics for this article

Agriculture is currently edited by Ms. Leda Xuan

More articles in Agriculture from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().