Читать книгу Sustainable Agriculture Systems and Technologies - Группа авторов - Страница 40

Crop diversification is of vital significance to improve livelihood, enhanced system productivity and at the same time maintain many of the ecosystem services. Diversified crop production systems are of 10 less risky, if managed proficiently, they are benefitted from synergisms among different compatible crops. The system productivity also increases by two to four times over sole cropping under diversified system of farming. The core characteristics of crop diversification is to ensure complementarily, among the selected crops in spatial and temporal dimension. Hence, the resource use efficiency is also increasing with minimal wastage of the inputs. By 2050, the food supply must double to cope for rising population pressure, and impact of climate change will further create complexity in ensuring food security. It is high time to address the constraints as explained above for wider adoption. The crop diversification has also been identified as a climate smart technology to combat the risks due to climate change in agricultural production system. Under stressed ecologies like drought and flood‐prone areas, CD is an ideal approach for mitigating the negative impact of adverse weather conditions. Another vital characteristic of the agricultural diversification is efficient use of on‐farm resources, better recycling of by‐products which maintain ecosystem services for improving long‐term system sustainability.