Productivity, resource-use efficiency and profitability of high-value crops embedded diversified cropping systems

A field experiment was conducted during rainy (kharif), winter (rabi) and summer seasons of 2015-17 on a sandy clay loam soil at New Delhi to evaluate 5 cropping systems, viz. maize-pea-okra, maize-mustard-green gram, cotton-wheat, bottle gourd-onion and okra-wheat, for productivity, profitability and resource-use efficiency. The experiment was laid-out in a randomized block design replicated 4 times. Bottle gourd-onion cropping system recorded the highest wheat-grain-equivalent yield (WGEY) of 19.9 t/ha followed by maize-pea-okra (14.06 t/ha). The lowest WGEY was recorded with maize-mustard-green gram (9.12 t/ha). The gross returns ((sic) 313.56 x 10(3)/ha), net returns ((sic) 123.5 x 10(3)/ha), B: C ratio (3.23), production efficiency (54.52 kg/ha/day) and monetary efficiency (593 (sic)/ha/day) were also higher with bottle gourd-onion cropping system, while maize-mustard-green gram registered the lowest gross returns, net returns and B: C ratio. All the five cropping systems can substitute the existing rice - wheat cropping system under marginal farmers situations, not only by providing higher productivity and returns, but also a regular income throughout the year.