Multi-tier rice + aquaculture + horticulture + agro-forestry + duckery system
This model
helps in improvement of soil fertility, providing life-saving irrigation to
crops during mid-season drought as well as drainage of water from field due to
in-built micro-watersheds, and biocontrol of weeds and other pests, suitable
for adoption in rainfed lowland ecosystem of East and south-eastern coastal
plain and North eastern coastal plain
Area Requirement
for the model:
one-hectare area
Enterprise and
area allotment: The model includes land shaping in the form of uplands (Tier I
and tier II) covering about 15 % of field area followed by rice field area of
40% as rainfed lowland (tier III) and deep water (tier IV). This rice field is
connected to a micro water shed cum fish refuge (pond) of 20 % area for growing
of fish and prawn with the rice crop. Raised and wide bunds are made all around
using 25 % of the farm area with interventions includes fruits vegetables, root
and tuber crops in tier I and II, rice-vegetables/ field crops in tier III and
IV, composite fish culture with fresh water prawn (1:1) in pond refuge,
silviculture plants, 50-100 ducks on pond dyke.
Income: The
productivity of the system is about 8 t of rice crop/hectare (rice-rice), one
ton of fish and prawn per hectare, 20-25 t of vegetables/ha and 8.5 to 51.7 t
of tuber crops/ha. The cropping intensity in this system greatly increases to
170 % in field and 360 % in the upland.