1 National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development, Kolkata-16.
2 Division of Agricultural Engineering, I.A.R.I, New Delhi - 110012, India.
Farm pond excavation in individual farmer's fields for storing excess rain water during the monsoon and reusing it for life saving irrigation to the crops during the post-monsoon period, besides practising pisciculture, is gaining popularity among the farmers of coastal saline zone. With a view to assess the techno-economic feasibility of farm pond excavation under field conditions in the coastal belt, a field study in 24 Parganas (South) district of West Bengal was conducted during. The study revealed that in the pre-developmental stage only mono-crop of Aman (kharif) Paddy was cultivated whereas in the post-developmental stage (i.e. after excavation of farm pond) the farmers were able to grow different kinds of vegetables and pulses besides practising pisciculture. Further, the techno-economic feasibility has established that the farm ponds have tremendous potential in turning the mono-cropped coastal saline area into multi-cropped/crop-diversified area and improve the cropping intensity and thereby the farmers' income.
