Prospect of double cropping of rainfed rice in West Bengal

Abstract

The prospect of double cropping of rain fed rice in West Bengal has been studied in two agroecological conditions (Canning, located in coastal saline region and Nagri, located in Red lateritic region) by identifying growing season through the analysis of rainfall data. The rainfall data of these locations have been analysed for dry and wet weeks by assuming a dry threshold value of 20 mm per week. Wet and dry weeks have been subjected to Markov Chain probability analysis and periods of ideal sowing have been determined. Rainfall data has also been accumulated from 1^st  week (1- 7 Jan) onwards, and 52nd week (24- 31 Dec) backwards and by subjecting it to ranking method, growth periods of dry and wet crops have been determined. The study reveals that generally from 24^th to 37^th week (11 Jun-16 Sep) the probability of getting wet weeks exceeds 15% and probability of two consecutive dry weeks is negligible from 20^th to 38^th week (14 May - 23 September) for both the statistics. It is also found that harvesting two rice crops of shorter duration is feasible during the growing period covering pre-monsoon and monsoon season.