Abstract
No-till farming is an age-old practice followed thousands of years ago, with the primitive farmers who used to make a hole in the soil and put seeds into it and then cover the seeds. During the year 1999, no-till farming was adopted on 45 million ha worldwide, which extended to 72 million ha in 2003 and to 157 million ha in 2013–2014. No-till farming paves the way for optimizing productivity and ecosystem services. It also has economic, environmental, and social benefits to the producer as well as to the society. Adoption of no-till farming also enables agriculture to respond to some of the global challenges that are associated with climate change and land and environment degradation, thereby increasing the cost of food, energy, and production inputs. In order to recognize no-till farming as a truly sustainable system, we have to ensure that it is being adopted in areas where it is currently low in practice. No-till or zero-tillage technology may be the possible substitute as this method reduces weed density and depress weeds growth. Also, there is reduction in production costs by saving water, energy, labor, and farm machinery and improving production while conserving natural resources and ensuring environmental safety. The global scenario also shows that no-till farming cannot be any more thought as a craze and non-sustainable but the system has established itself as a farming practice. Currently, sustainable agroecosystem management is gaining importance, and it can no more be neglected or ignored by scientists, extension workers, farmers, etc. While practicing no-till farming, it is inevitable that we need to apply herbicide rationally to control weeds. In India being an agrarian country, more than 50% of people are dependent on agriculture for their livelihood. Estimations clearly indicate that the annual crop losses could double without the use of crop production products. So we need to rely on agrochemicals, and they are the key inputs in agriculture for crop protection and better yield. The latest annual report (2017–2018) released by the Department of Chemicals and Petrochemicals has declared that the production capacity of agrochemical players in India is around 292 (000′ MT). In the current financial year, the production has risen by 2.9%. India’s agrochemical consumption is one of the lowest in the world with per-hectare consumption being just 0.6 kg. However, the use of herbicides has been increasing due to shortages of farm labor and concerns about the affordability of labor costs. The aforementioned reasons have been the primary drivers for the growing popularity of agrochemicals and herbicides, which is expected to emerge as a key growth segment. However, continuous use of herbicides for a prolonged period creates herbicide resistance and dominance of particular weed species or changes in weed flora to a greater extent. In this chapter, an attempt has been made to crystallize the information on the use of herbicides and its implications under no-till farming.
Keywords
- No-till farming
- Conservation agriculture
- Herbicides in no-till farming
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.
Buying options
References
Arshad MA, Schnitzer M, Angers DA, Ripmeester JA (1990) Effects of till vs no-till on the quality of soil organic matter. Soil Biol Biochem 22:595–599
Bernoux M et al (2006) Cropping systems, carbon sequestration and erosion in Brazil, a review. Agron Sustain Dev 26:1–8
Derpsch R (2001) Keynote: frontiers in conservation tillage and advances in conservation practice. Sustaining the Global Farm. Selected Papers from the 10th International Soil Conservation Meeting
Derpsch R, Friedrich T (2009) Global overview of Conservation Agriculture adoption. Invited Paper, 4th World Congress on Conservation Agriculture: Innovations for Improving Efficiency, Equity and Environment. New Delhi, ICAR (www.fao.org/ag/ca)
Doran JW, Zeiss MR (2000) Soil health and sustainability: managing the biotic component of soil quality. Appl Soil Ecol 15:3–11
Fan J, McConkey B, Wang H, Janzen H (2016) Root distribution by depth for temperate agricultural crops. F Crop Res 189:68–74
FAO (2008) An international technical workshop on investing in sustainable crop intensification: the case for improving soil health. In: Proceedings of FAO, Rome, 22–24 July 2008
FAO (2010) Basic principles of conservation agriculture. http://www.fao.org/ag/ca/
Fernández R, Quiroga A, Zorati C, Noellemeyer E (2010) Carbon contents and respiration rates of aggregate size fractions under no-till and conventional tillage. Soil Tillage Res 109:103–109
Friedrich T, Kassam AH (2009) Adoption of conservation agriculture technologies: constraints and opportunities. Invited paper, IV World Congress on Conservation Agriculture, New Delhi, India, 4–7 February 2009
Friedrich T, Kassam AH, Shaxson F (2009a) Conservation agriculture. In: Agriculture for developing countries. Science and Technology Options Assessment (STOA) project. European Technology Assessment Group, Karlsruhe, Germany.
Friedrich T, Kassam AH, Taher F (2009b) Adoption of conservation agriculture and the role of policy and institutional support. Invited keynote paper presented at the International Consultation on No-Till with Soil Cover and Crop Rotation: A Basis for Policy Support to Conservation Agriculture for Sustainable Production Intensification. Astana-Shortandy, Kazakhstan
Gupta RK, Hobbs PR, Ladha JK, Prabhakar SVRK (2002) Resource conservation technologies. In: Transforming the rice-wheat system of the Indo-Gangetic plains. Asia-Pacific Association of Agricultural Research Institutions, FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok. p 42
Helgason BL, Walley FL, Germida JJ (2010) No-till soil management increases microbial biomass and alters community profiles in soil aggregates. Appl Soil Ecol 46:390–397
Hobbs PR (2007) Conservation agriculture: what is it and why is it important for future sustainable food production. J Agr Sci 145(2):127–137
Junior RC et al (2012) No-till agriculture in southern Brazil. FAO
Kassam A, Friedrich T, Derpsch R, Lahmar R, Mrabet R, Basch G et al (2012) Conservation agriculture in the dry Mediterranean climate. Field Crop Res 132:7–17
Kassam AH, Friedrich T, Shaxson F, Pretty J (2009) The spread of conservation agriculture: justification, sustainability and uptake. Int J Agric Sustain 7(4):292–320
Kong AYY, Fonte SJ, van Kessel C, Six J (2009) Transitioning from standard to minimum tillage: trade-offs between soil organic matter stabilization, nitrous oxide emissions, and N availability in irrigated cropping systems. Soil Tillage Res 104:256–262
Lal R (2009) The plow and agricultural sustainability. J Sustain Agric 33:66–84
Lal R (2013) Enhancing ecosystem services with no-till. Renew Agric Food Syst 28:102–114
Mann RA, Ashraf M, Hassan G (2004) Wheat establishment with zero tillage for integrated weed management. Pakistan J Weed Sci Res 10:17–24
Petersen SO, Mutegi JK, Hansen EM, Munkholm LJ (2011) Tillage effects on N2O emissions as influenced by a winter cover crop. Soil Biol Biochem 43:1509–1517
Ribeiro MFS, et al (2007) Conservation agriculture research in Brazil. KASSA
Scopel AL, Ballare CL, Sànchez RA (1991) Induction of extreme light sensitivity in buried weed seeds and its role in the perception of soil cultivations. Plant Cell Environ 14:501508
Six J, Elliott ET, Paustian K (2000) Soil macroaggregate turnover and microaggregate formation: a mechanism for C sequestration under no-tillage agriculture. Soil Biol Biochem 32:2099–2103
Smith P et al (2007) [Agriculture] Climate Change 2007: Mitigation. Contribution of Working Group III to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Metz, B. et al. (ed.)] (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, USA)
Sorrenson WJ (1997) Paraguay financial and economic implications of no-tillage and crop rotations compared to conventional cropping systems. FAO
Swanton CJ, Weise SF (1991) Integrated weed management: the rationale and approach. Weed Technol 5:657–663
Thomas GA, Dalal RC, Standley J (2007) No-till effects on organic matter, pH, cation exchange capacity and nutrient distribution in a Luvisol in the semi-arid subtropics. Soil Tillage Res 94:295–304
Vogel E, Deumlich D, Kaupenjohann M (2016) Bioenergy maize and soil erosion—risk assessment and erosion control concepts. Geoderma 261:80–92
Wall PC, Causarano H (1993) The reversal of soil degradation in the wheat-soybean cropping system of the southern cone of South America. Developing sustainable wheat production systems: The 8th Reg Wheat Workshop
West TO, Post WM (2002) Soil organic carbon sequestration rates by tillage and crop rotation. Soil Sci Soc of Am J 66:1930–1946
Zotarelli L, Alves BJR, Urquiaga S, Boddey RM, Six J (2007) Impact of tillage and crop rotation on light fraction and intra-aggregate soil organic matter in two Oxisols. Soil Tillage Res 95:196–206
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Maheswari, S.T. (2021). Use of Herbicide and Its Implications Under No-Till Farming: An Overview. In: Jayaraman, S., Dalal, R.C., Patra, A.K., Chaudhari, S.K. (eds) Conservation Agriculture: A Sustainable Approach for Soil Health and Food Security . Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-0827-8_21
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-0827-8_21
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-16-0826-1
Online ISBN: 978-981-16-0827-8
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)
