Koushik Brahmachari

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Professor at Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya

In the present investigation, the effect of various stress-mitigating chemicals on growth and yield of lentil (cv. Moitree) grown was studied under two diverse soil conditions. Lentils sown in new alluvial soil exhibited greater germination rates compared to those in coastal saline soil. The salicylic acid (SA) treatment resulted in the tallest...

Agricultural research has consistently progressed through the integration of advanced technologies into farming systems. A significant paradigm shift in agricultural production system research has occurred with the development of simulation models, most notably the Agricultural Production System Simulator (APSIM). The APSIM supports a wide range of...

Rice (Oryza sativa L.), a staple food grain for two-thirds of the world population faces declining yields due to over-reliance on inorganic fertilizers. Biostimulants like seaweed extracts, rich in nutrients and growth-promoting substances, are now the crying need for enhancing rice production and its quality too. A field experiment on winter rice...

Indian Sundarbans, a part of the largest delta on planet Earth, is one of the most stressed regions in the world from crop production point of view. Dry season crop production is limited by the non-availability of suitable irrigation water, which can only be supplied from surface water resources. The present research aimed at assessing the dynamics...

Agriculture in the Indian Sundarbans deltaic region primarily depends on a rice-based monocropping system during the rainy season, with the subsequent season often remaining fallow. To mitigate this issue, a series of experiments using zero tillage and straw mulching (ZTSM) potato cultivation were conducted over eight consecutive years (2017–2024)...

The coastal saline zone of West Bengal in India is the home to millions of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people. Due to a gradual increase in salt accumulation on soils of the coastal saline zone of West Bengal in India from winter to summer days, cultivation of the second crop in the winter season becomes possible in a limited area. To a...

The polders and islands in the salt-affected coastal zone of the Ganges Delta, home to approximately 15 million people in Bangladesh and 5 million in West Bengal, face challenges such as poverty, food insecurity, environmental vulnerability, and limited livelihood opportunities. Historically, agricultural production in these areas was mainly confin...

Nuisance imposed by biotic and abiotic stressors on diverse agroecosystems remains an area of focus for the scientific fraternity. However, emerging contaminants such as microplastics (MP) have imposed additional dimension (alone or in combinations with other stressors) in agroecosystems and keep escalating the challenges to achieve sustainability....

Coastal ecosystems face numerous constraints, including erratic rainfall distribution, seawater intrusion, water stagnation with saline water, seasonal escalation of soil salinity, fluctuations in groundwater table depth, and variable moisture availability in the crop rhizosphere. While rice in the Kharif season navigates these challenges with the...

Agricultural research and extension projects aimed at socioeconomic and ecological development in the coastal saline zone (CSZ) often face serious operational challenges. Crop management practices in these stressed ecosystems confront stiff climatic (cyclonic storms, extreme high and extreme low rainfall, prolonged hot dry spells), edaphic (soil sa...

Due to its versatile active ingredients, Indian biodiversity provides ample opportunity to search for putative therapeutics for the worst needy health conditions. Medicinal plants offer many natural remedies and are recognized as safe therapeutics. In India, the majority of people suffer from gastrointestinal disease due to poor living conditions,...

Nanomaterials (NMs) have proven to be a game-changer in agriculture, showcasing their potential to boost plant growth and safeguarding crops. The agricultural sector has widely adopted NMs, benefiting from their small size, high surface area, and optical properties to augment crop productivity and provide protection against various stressors. This...

The coastal region of West Bengal, India, is vulnerable to the tropical cyclones from the Bay of Bengal often causing loss of life, infrastructure damage, agricultural devastation, and environmental degradation exemplified by the devastating impacts of Amphan in May 2020 and Yaas in May 2021. Considering the importance of accurately mapping flood e...

The coastal saline zone of West Bengal is the home of millions of resource-challenged and vulnerable people. This zone is characterized by high rainfall in the kharif (rainy) season followed by long dry winter and summer months with elevated soil salinity. Cultivating the winter season crop after harvesting rainy season rice is challenging due to l...

Environmental security is essential to ensuring food security for an ever-growing population. Agriculture is the significant contributor to greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions due to the imbalance and excessive use of chemical compounds, energy, and high consumption of fossil-fuel. Ploughing, irrigation, and applying synthetic fertilisers or pesticides...

Along with other Asian Mega Deltas, the Ganges Delta, and its coastal zone, are attracting increased attention due to the threats posed by climate change and the extent of rural poverty, juxtaposed against the potential for systems intensification and improved livelihoods. While it is a salt-affected zone, the constraints to systems intensification...

Agriculture in the Indian Sundarbans is mainly dominated by kharif rice-based cropping systems. The cropping intensity of this region largely depends on growing cycle of kharif rice. The present study aimed to determine the spectral pattern of kharif rice and estimate the rice grown area in the Gosaba CD block of Indian Sundarbans in 2017, 2018, an...

Agriculture production must be substantially increased in order to support the urgent requirement for food for the rapidly growing population. The depletion of natural resources combined with a hiking tendency in climatic variability has already harmed the worldwide agricultural production system. Numerous factors have a major role in determining h...

Climate change predictions may benefit from an awareness of how current changes have impacted food availability. Many agricultural activities throughout the globe have seen fast climate change over the last few decades, and greenhouse gas (GHG) levels in the atmosphere have also surged. Because of the near inevitability that climate and CO2 trends...

A field experiment was conducted during the rabi season of 2019-20 at the District Seed Farm, C-unit of Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Kalyani, West Bengal, on clay-loam soil (Inseptisols) to study the effects of sowing dates and zinc levels for hybrid maize in the new alluvial zone of West Bengal. The experiment was laid out in a split plot...

The present study assessed the seasonal and inter-annual variation in cropping pattern and crop acreage during summer (mid-February to May) and winter (November to January) seasons of 2017-2018, 2018-2019, and 2019-2020 cropping years over the Gosaba Block of Indian Sundarbans. Multi-temporal Sentinel-2 images acquired during the critical crop grow...

Identifying productive, profitable, and less risky cropping systems is pivotal for ensuring sustainable farm–based livelihoods in the context of climatic uncertainties and market volatility, particularly in many developing nations. Conventional field crop research often identifies the best or optimal solutions based on treatment replicates at a spe...

Identifying productive, profitable and less risky cropping systems is important for sustaining farm-based livelihoods in the context of climatic uncertainties and market volatility in many developing nations. Reductionist field crop research identifies the best-bet solutions based on treatment replicates at a single point in time, which may not acc...

Accurate assessment of seasonal crop coverage and cropping intensity is important for crop planning. The traditional approach of cropping area mapping relied on statistical reports, inventory records, as well as extensive field observations. The satellite based remote sensing provides ample opportunity for continuous monitoring of agricultural acti...

Food availability is one of the dimensions of food security, and it is necessary to analyze the crop production scenario to estimate the availability of food in a region. Cropping sequence and cropping intensity indicate the seasonal crop production, thereby indicating the seasonal availability of food. Seasonal variation of per capita or per house...

Curcumin, the yellow principle of the Indian Turmeric, ‘Haldi’ has recently attracted renewed interest in the field of experimental medicine with pleiotropic activity. This review has emphasized three pharmaceutical studies of interest: the pharmacokinetics, pharmacology, and pharmacodynamics of curcumin. In this review, we attempted to review the...

The brown-top millet has huge untapped potential for drylands in terms of assuring food, nutrition, and livelihood security to smallholders. As a drought-tolerant and climate-smart crop, it provides enough scope as an adaptation option to combat ill effects of global warming and climate change. The crop is resistant to various biotic and abiotic st...

Certificate of Acceptance by Professor Gerhard Litscher, Editor in Chief

Chemical pesticides and fertilizers are well known in today’s farming system and played asignificant role in boosting the crop yield during the last four to five decades worldwide. But on the otherhand, excessive use of these chemicals has been degrading natural resources (soil, water, air) globally andleads to increase environmental pollution. W...

Nutrient and weed management in crops and especially cropping system play an important role to enhance productivity and sustainability in different cropping systems. A field experiment was conducted for two consecutive years to evaluate the effect of nutrient management in preceding crops and integrated weed management practices in summer greengram...

This report describes the outcomes of a research project that ran from 2016 to 2020. The aim of this project was to sustainably increase cropping intensity and productivity in the coastal zones of Bangladesh and West Bengal particularly in the dry (Rabi) season through integrated soil, water, and crop management.

Synthetic fertilizer and herbicides encompass the largest share in nutrient and weed management on food grain crops that create serious environmental issues. Integrated nutrient and non-chemical weed management approaches may help to reduce the chemical load in the environment, maintaining higher weed control efficiency and yield. A field experimen...

Synthetic fertilizer and herbicides encompass the largest share in nutrient and weed management on food grain crops that create serious environmental issues. Integrated nutrient and non-chemical weed management approaches may help to reduce the chemical load in the environment, maintaining higher weed control efficiency and yield. A field experimen...

Soil, water, nutrients, agrochemicals, and energy are important natural resources and as well as agricultural inputs needed to sustain global food production. The overexploitation and irrational supply of these farming inputs to intensify the crop production is an alarming issue for the farming communities, policymakers, and scientists as it is dif...

Facing cold stress is amajor constraint in seedling production during the winter season as, most particularly in recent times due to uncertain climatic conditions, no sustainable technology has been reported that could be easily adopted by farmers withlimited resources. Therefore, field experiments were carried out during winter 2017–2018 and 2018–...

Due to the seasonal increase in soil salt accumulation after cessation of monsoon rains, the simulation of cropping system performance becomes highly challenging in coastal saline cropping areas. Rapidly changing groundwater (GW) dynamics during this period (GW depth and salinity) drive changes in capillary soil moisture rise, soil evaporation and...

Arsenic (As) contamination and its adverse consequences on rice agroecosystem are well known. Rice has the credit to feed more than 50% of the world population but concurrently, rice accumulates a substantial amount of As, thereby compromising food security. The gravity of the situation lays in the fact that the population in theAs uncontaminated a...

In order to assess the climatological risk in terms of the dry week probabilities and length of the growing period of Indian Sundarbans region for successful crop planning, the present study was conducted using long term rainfall data from 1984 to 2018 received in Gosaba CD (Community Development) block of Indian Sundarbans. The probability of a ra...

In modern days, rapid urbanisation, climatic abnormalities, water scarcity and quality degradation vis-à-vis the increasing demand for food to feed the growing population necessitate a more efficient agriculture production system. In this context, farming with zeolites, hydrated naturally occurring aluminosilicates found in sedimentary rocks, which...

Field experiments were carried out during winter 2015–2016 and 2016–2017 at research farm of Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, West Bengal, India to study the growth, productivity, quality, and profitability of potato (cv. Kufri Jyoti) cultivation as influenced by foliar application of different seaweed extracts, i.e., Kappaphycus alvarezii sap...

Intensive agriculture is based on the use of high energy inputs, quality planting materials with assured irrigation, but it failed to assure agricultural sustainability because of creation of ecological imbalance and degradation of natural resources. On the other hand, intercropping system, also known as mixed cropping or polyculture, a traditional...

The shock of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has disrupted food systems worldwide. Such disruption affecting multiple systems interfaces in smallholder agriculture is unprecedented and needs to be understood from multi-stakeholder perspectives. The multiple loops of causalityy in the pathways of impact renders the system outcomes unpredictable....

Sustainability and climate change are the two major challenges to the agricultural production system. The trade-off between them is essential for higher profitability. The energy assessment is essential for judging the sustainability and vulnerability of a production system. Besides, nutrient management and weed management are equally imperative to...

Continuous rice–wheat cropping system with intensive conventional tillage operations have been showing natural resource degradation. Hence, the sustainability of this major cropping system in eastern India is under a threat. Adoption of resource conservation such as conservation tillage practice with residue retention on the soil and diversificatio...

Intercropping provides ample scope to incorporate at least two or more crops at a time in same piece of land aiming at higher productivity from unit land area through optimized utilization of available resources. Selection of crops, planting geometry and optimum stand and crop maturity are important factors influencing success of intercropping syst...

Increasing productivity of maize while decreasing production costs and maintaining soil health are emerging challenges for the rice–maize system in South Asia. A range of integrated nutrient and weed management practices were tested in winter maize for their effects on yield, profitability, and soil health. The nutrient management treatments were a...

ncreasing productivity of maize while decreasing production costs and maintaining soil health are emerging challenges for the rice–maize system in South Asia. A range of integrated nutrient and weed management practices were tested in winter maize for their effects on yield, profitability, and soil health. The nutrient management treatments were a...

Crop residues, the byproduct of crop production, are valuable natural resources that can be managed to maximize different input use efficiencies. Crop residue management is a well-known and widely accepted practice, and is a key component of conservation agriculture. The rapid shift from conventional agriculture to input-intensive modern agricultur...

Rice (Oryza sativa) has been regarded as one of the oldest food crops, feeding more than half (55% approximately) of the entire world population. Seventy-five percent of the daily calorific demand is fulfilled by polished white rice in Asian population. Besides being easily digestible, rice also has a considerable amount of protein and a significan...

Declining rate of productivity and environmental sustainability is forcing growers to use organic manures as a source of nutrient supplement in maize farming. However, weed is a major constraint to maize production. A field study was carried out over two seasons to evaluate various integrated nutrient and weed management practices in hybrid maize....

Producing rice grain with superior quality along with higher productivity is very much needed to improve the food and nutrient security. Therefore, this experiment was designed to determine the effect of seaweed sap derived from the red seaweed Kappaphycus alvarezii (K–sap) on quality improvement of rice grown under rice–potato–greengram crop seque...

In the coastal zone of the Ganges Delta, water shortages due to soil salinity limit the yield of dry season crops. To alleviate water shortage as a consequence of salinity stress in the coastal saline ecosystem, the effect of different water-saving (WS) and water-conserving options was assessed on growth, yield and water use of tomato; two field ex...

Rice is one of the most important food crops for South Asian countries. Millions of farm families of these countries followed various rice-based cropping system grown in different growing ecologies. But present days, this most prominent cropping system have to face several challenges like harsh environments (high temperatures, diffuse light conditi...

In order to develop weather-based yield prediction models for rice and grass pea in coastal saline zone of W est Bengal, the experiments were conducted with rice (cv. CR 1017) and grass pea (cv. Bio L 212) in the rainy and winter seasons, respectively of 2016-17 and 2017-18. Rice was sown in nursery bed on six different dates starting from June 15...

This study compares thirteen rice-based cropping systems in the coastal part of West Bengal, India in terms of productivity, profitability, energetics, and emissions. Information on the crop management practices of these systems was collected on 60 farms through a questionnaire survey. Rice-bitter gourd system was observed to have the highest syste...

The costal saline zone of West Bengal in India is the home for millions of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people. Due to gradual increase in salt accumulation on soils of the costal saline zone of West Bengal in India from winter to summer days, cultivation of the second crop in winter season becomes possible in a limited area. To address...

Due to seasonal dry-season salt accumulation in the coastal saline zone (CSZ) of West Bengal, India, the cultivation of winter crops (following summer rice) is rare. To address this issue, field experiments were conducted over two years (2016–18) in the CSZ to study the feasibility of cropping system intensification through incorporating grass pea...

In order to assess the effect of agroclimatic factors on the development and production of lentil (cv. WBL 77) grown under different sowing dates and land situations, an experiment was conducted during the winter seasons of 2016-17 and 2017-18 in the coastal saline zones of West Bengal. Lentil was sown on six different dates starting from 23rd Nove...

The Costal Saline Zone (CSZ) of West Bengal, India is dominated by rice-fallow-fallow system cropping system. Only 4% of the cultivated area of the coastal zone can be irrigated with available sweet water. To cope up with the present situation is introduction of new high value crops to catch the fallow winter period emphasizing on water saving tech...

A field experiment was conducted in kharif (rainy) and rabi (winter) season of 2016-17 and 2017-18 at District Seed Farm, C-Unit, Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Kalyani, Nadia to assess the efficacy of some post-emergence herbicides in rice and it’s residual effect on succeeding grass pea crop. The experiment was laid out in randomized block...

Due to salt accumulation in the upper layers of soil during the dry season, the cultivation of a second crop in rabi season in coastal saline zone (CSZ) of West Bengal is limited to only a few areas with a resultant low cropping intensity. But inclusion of pulses, as utera crop, is a potential option in rice-fallow areas with a dual advantage of cr...

Application of satellite based remote sensing in agriculture has reached a new level with introduction of medium to high resolution earth observation satellites like Landsat series, SPOT, Sentinel-2, etc. This study assesses the cropping system and the spatio-temporal variability of crops and fallow land particularly during the post-monsoon season,...

This study evaluates the impact of improved agricultural technologies that were introduced in selected areas of coastal West Bengal (India) during 2016-2018 to demonstrate their ability to improve the agricultural, social and economic status of farming communities in the study region. The study employed participatory innovation tree (PIT) exercise...

The coastal zone of the Ganges delta has many constraints and threats that have hampered development. However, recent research indicates that there are numerous viable options for cropping systems intensification that have yet to be fully exploited. The main opportunity involves changing the cropping season to use stored water with a low solute pot...

The Ganges coastal zone is the contiguous area covering southern Bangladesh and Sundarbans region of West Bengal, India. Agriculture in this zone is the main source of livelihood for the inhabitants; however, it is influenced by several climate, soil, and anthropogenic activities. This zone is covered by polders in Bangladesh and islands in West Be...

To identify the risk free cropping window for kharif rice cultivation  To analyze the effect of dry spell on rice productivity Historical rainfall data (1984-2018) was analyzed using Markov chain model and probability of dry and wet spells were determined using 20 mm rainfall as threshold (Manikandan et al., 2017 and Dugal et al., 2018). Where, 2D...

Gosaba island of Indian Sundraban comes under the coastal saline zone of West Bengal. Non-availability of quality water for irrigation is one of the major limitations for growing crop during post monsoon season (Malik et al, 2016). Surface water resource is the only option to irrigate crops. Distribution, seasonality and quality of water determines...

Aim: Cereal-legume cropping system has been proved to be one of the best alternatives for a productive as well as profitable farming in West Bengal. Maize is an important cereal crop which is widely grown during rainy (kharif) season throughout the State. While garden pea, a short duration winter (rabi) season vegetable, can easily fit in any exist...

Field experiment was conducted to evaluate the performance of different rice cultivars in terms of growth, nutrient uptake and productivity at Regional Research Station (Coastal Saline Zone), Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Kakdwip, South 24-Parganas, West Bengal during the rainy seasons of 2015 and 2016. High yielding rice cultivars-Pratiksh...

The red and lateritic zone (RLZ) of Eastern India comprises of southwest part of West Bengal, a part of Odisha and Jahrkhand grimly a low position in respect of yield levels compared to many other parts of India. Soil of this area is poor in inherent fertility status with low to medium available nutrients of phosphorus, potassium and calcium. Most...

To meet the goals of sustainable agricultural development and to answer the questions of global food security agricultural activities in the stressed regions should come under focus.  Coastal saline zone of West Bengal, one of the most ecologically fragile and climatically vulnerable region in India, is the home of millions people, around 65% of w...

Field experiment was conducted to evaluate the performance of different rice cultivars in terms of growth, nutrient uptake and productivity at Regional Research Station (Coastal Saline Zone), Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Kakdwip, South 24-Parganas, West Bengal during the rainy seasons of 2015 and 2016. High yielding rice cultivars-Pratiksh...

The costal saline zone of West Bengal in India is the home for millions of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people (Malik et al., 2016). 4.2 lakh ha of coastal area is cultivated in the wet season; during the rest six to seven months the lands generally remain fallow. Efficient use of water is highly critical to sustain agricultural product...

The alkaline fly ash (pH 8.3-8.6) emitting from Kolaghat Thermal Power Plant (KTPP), West Bengal, India, effectively renders the soil reaction (pH 7.58-8.01) of the adjacent land. The soil-fly ash mixtures predict the increase in pH influenced by fly ash. At 5% level of significance within 4 km from KTPP, calculated t-values exceed the tabulated on...