Effect of cropping system on production and chemical and biological properties of soil

A field study was carried out at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi, India, for three crop years (2000–2001 to 2003–2004) to find out the effect of cropping systems on the production and chemical and biological properties of soil. Rice-potato-mungbean cropping system gave 59–89% higher productivity, 30–46% higher protein yield, 18–38% higher energy output and resulted in 7–16% higher available P, 60% higher fungi population, 15% higher actinomycetes population, 14% higher microbial biomass and 3% higher CO2 evolution in soil than rice-wheat cropping system. Rice-rapeseed-mungbean cropping system also gave 12–15% higher productivity, 19–26% higher protein yield and resulted in 11–18% higher available P, 65% higher fungi population, 22% higher actinomycetes population, 12% higher microbial biomass and 2% higher CO2 evolution in soil than rice-wheat cropping system. However, the rice-potato-mungbean cropping system was significantly superior to the rice-rapeseed-mungbean cropping system in productivity, protein yield and energy output and thus recommended as in alternative to rice-wheat cropping system.