Soil moisture conservation: agro-techniques for rainfed rabi sorghum

摘要

Sorghum in India is traditionally grown for grain (food and feed) and stalks (as animal fodder). Of late, sweet sorghum is emerging as a potential feedstock for biofuels. With the threat of climate change looming large on the crop productivity, sorghum being a drought hardy crop will play an important role in food, feed and fodder security in dryland economy. Cultivation of rabi sorghum on residual soil moisture and occurrence of terminal drought are the major reasons of low productivity of rabi sorghum. The productivity and input-use efficiency of rabi sorghum could be enhanced by adopting in-situ moisture conservation techniques and soil-specific production technologies.