Potential and Advantages of Maize-Legume Intercropping System

Maitra, Sagar; Shankar, Tanmoy; Banerjee, Pradipta

doi:10.5772/intechopen.91722

Cited by 25 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 32 publications

(31 reference statements)

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“…The appropriate crop mixtures show complementarity among the species cultivated and yield advantage is observed. Furthermore, in a study in West Bengal India, by Maitra et al [48] it was noted that finger millet, when intercropped with red gram or groundnut (4:1 ratio), expressed benefits in terms of more net return and benefit: cost ratio than other combinations considered like finger millet + green gram and finger millet + soybean in rainfed conditions. Similarly, Fan et al [49], recorded more grain output of faba bean + maize; but the yield of fava bean was less in a faba bean + wheat intercrop combination.…”

Section: Crop Choicementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Intercropping in maize is very common and legumes are preferably chosen in maize-based intercropping system. In different intercropping studies, it was noted that maize + legume combination registered more yield with greater use of resources [28,48] which are the primary goals of the intercropping system. There are several crop species which may be considered in intercropping, like annuals, perennials and mixture of the both.…”

Section: Crop Choicementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Hence, the crops chosen should be of different duration with dissimilarity in the form of growth and morphology as they can exhibit complementarity among themselves. As an example, it may be stated that maize has been considered a suitable cereal species and also treated as a base crop in the intercropping system in association with preferably dissimilar legumes of shorter lifecycle [48]. Green gram or black gram is of short duration pulse crops when grown as intercrop in association with the base crop of maize, pulses enter into the reproductive stage before maize reaches to the knee-height stage (approximately 6-7 weeks after planting) and thus least competition is observed among the crops.…”

Section: Crop Maturitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Willey and Osiru [86] gave the idea of the LER and it is described as the proportionate land area required under a pure stand of crop species to yield the same product as obtained under an intercropping at the same management level [48]. The LER of intercropped plots are estimated for each component crops separately by adding the estimated total of two varieties; the LER of the sole crop is taken as unity (1).…”

Section: Land Equivalent Ratio (Ler)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Intercropping—A Low Input Agricultural Strategy for Food and Environmental Security

et al. 2021

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Intensive agriculture is based on the use of high-energy inputs and quality planting materials with assured irrigation, but it has failed to assure agricultural sustainability because of creation of ecological imbalance and degradation of natural resources. On the other hand, intercropping systems, also known as mixed cropping or polyculture, a traditional farming practice with diversified crop cultivation, uses comparatively low inputs and improves the quality of the agro-ecosystem. Intensification of crops can be done spatially and temporally by the adoption of the intercropping system targeting future need. Intercropping ensures multiple benefits like enhancement of yield, environmental security, production sustainability and greater ecosystem services. In intercropping, two or more crop species are grown concurrently as they coexist for a significant part of the crop cycle and interact among themselves and agro-ecosystems. Legumes as component crops in the intercropping system play versatile roles like biological N fixation and soil quality improvement, additional yield output including protein yield, and creation of functional diversity. But growing two or more crops together requires additional care and management for the creation of less competition among the crop species and efficient utilization of natural resources. Research evidence showed beneficial impacts of a properly managed intercropping system in terms of resource utilization and combined yield of crops grown with low-input use. The review highlights the principles and management of an intercropping system and its benefits and usefulness as a low-input agriculture for food and environmental security.

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Section: Crop Choicementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Crop Choicementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Crop Maturitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Land Equivalent Ratio (Ler)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Intercropping—A Low Input Agricultural Strategy for Food and Environmental Security

et al. 2021

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“…The use of land resource efficient where the shortage of land entices the peasants to cultivate more than one crop on the same small piece of land is one of the key reasons for including intercropping method in the conventional farming system (O'Callaghan et al, 1994). Other researchers who received higher LER from maize intercropping were Patra et al (1990) who intercropped maize with pigeon pea, Mandimba (1995) with groundnut, and Kalia et al, (1992) and Ullah et al, (2007) with soybean. All of the intercropping systems do have the potential of giving substantially higher net income over single-cropping.…”

Section: Land Equivalent Ratio (Ler)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of herbicides and intercropping on weeds and yields of Maize and the associated intercrops

Bibi¹,

Khan²,

Hussain³

et al. 2019

PAK.J.BOT.

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Two field trials were conducted at the farm of the University of Agriculture Peshawar, Pakistan in 2014 and 2015, to investigate the effect of intercropping on maize, mungbean, cowpea and sesbania, in which maize was the main crop and the others were intercrops. A two factorial design was used. Factor A comprised of pendimethalin application as pre-emergence and no herbicide application. Factor B consisted of four mono-cropping treatments of Zea mays L. (maize), Vigna radiata (L.) R. Wilczek (mungbean), Sesbania sesban (L.) Merr. (sesbania), and Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp. (cowpea), along with six intercropping treatments viz. 5 legumes rows and 6 maize rows in combinations i.e. mungbean+maize, cowpea+maize, sesbania+maize, and also 10 legume crops rows and 6 maize rows in combinations mungbean+maize, cowpea+maize, and sesbania+maize. The results indicated a significant influence of the years, the use of herbicide, the treatments of intercropping, and the interaction effect of the herbicide x intercropping on the yields of studied crops which meant that the differences among the observations were statistically significant. For the year effect, the mean yields were higher in 2014; while for the effect of herbicide use, the maize grain yield was higher in pendimethalin applied plots. Stating the effect of intercropping, mungbean grain yield was highest in plots of mungbean mono-cropping and lowest in mungbean: maize intercropping (sown in ratio of 5:6 rows). Cowpea and sesbania biomasses were significantly higher in herbicide plots and also in mono-cropping plots of cowpea and sesbania plots, respectively in 2014 and 2015. The values of the Land Equivalent Ratio (LER) were between 1.40 and 1.49 for all the intercropping treatments, with the highest LER calculated for sesbaniamaize intercropping (10:6 rows). Therefore, the herbicide pendimethalin as pre-emergence @1.5 kg ha-1 in maize crop along with intercropping of any of the studied legume crops at the 1:1 row sowing ratio is the best combination for achieving desirable weed control, higher crop yields and greater LERs.

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Optimizing maize–bean cropping systems for sustainable intensification in southern Ethiopia

et al. 2022

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Declining productivity and scarcity of cultivable land in smallholder systems call for exploring sustainable intensification options to increase productivity. Field experiments were conducted at five sites (Sites 1-5) of the Sidama region, southern Ethiopia, in 2018 and 2019 to determine the effects of cropping systems on maize (Zea mays L.) and common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) productivity. The intercropping of common bean with maize at varying planting times (simultaneous, relay) and number (frequency) of legume intercropping (once or twice) per growing season were compared with monocultures of the components in randomized complete block design with four replications. Cropping system affected the agronomic parameters (pod number plant −1 and 100-seed weight) of common bean, more so than maize.Specifically, the results revealed that cropping systems affected both maize and bean yields, although the magnitude of the effect varied with sites. The highest maize yield was recorded in fertilized monoculture maize at Sites 1, 2, and 5, and in relay and sequential bean intercropping at Sites 3 and 4, respectively. Moreover, the highest bean yields were obtained in double common bean monoculture whereas, the lowest yields were recorded in relay intercropping. The total land equivalent ratio (LER) ranged from 1.2 to 1.8 and partial LER of maize was higher than that of the common bean. Sequential intercropping (Sites 1, 2, and 5) and relay intercropping (Sites 3 and 4) were economically more beneficial than the other cropping systems.Therefore, farmers could benefit more from maize-bean intercropping systems than monocultures in areas where maize is a staple crop.Abbreviations: 100-SW, hundred seed weight; ATER, area time equivalent ratio; Bn, common bean monoculture; Bn+Bn, double common bean monoculture; LER, land equivalent ratio; M+Bn, simultaneous common bean intercropping with maize; M+Bn+Bn, sequential common bean intercropping with maize; M+BnR, relay common bean intercropping with maize; M+F, maize monoculture with fertilizer; MAI, monetary advantage index; M-F, maize monoculture without fertilizer.This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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Potential and Advantages of Maize-Legume Intercropping System

Cited by 25 publications

References 32 publications

Intercropping—A Low Input Agricultural Strategy for Food and Environmental Security

Intercropping—A Low Input Agricultural Strategy for Food and Environmental Security

Effect of herbicides and intercropping on weeds and yields of Maize and the associated intercrops

Optimizing maize–bean cropping systems for sustainable intensification in southern Ethiopia

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