Productivity and Profitability Assessment of Drought Tolerant Rice Cultivars under Different Crop Management Practices in Central Terai of Nepal

Reduction in productivity has led to lower profitability of rice production in Nepal. Proper selections of resource conservation technologies and drought tolerant cultivars are being potential strategies determining productivity of rice in drought prone areas. Thus, a field experiment was accomplished in central-terai of Nepal during 2014 to assess the productivity and profitability of drought tolerant rice cultivars under different crop management practices. The experiment was carried out in strip-plot design with three replications consisting four drought tolerant rice cultivars and three crop management practices. The analyzed data revealed that SRI (System of Rice Intensification) produced significantly higher grain yield (5.28 t ha-1) than other management practices. The straw yield of SRI (5.12 t ha-1) was also significantly higher than other management practices. The cultivars had no influence on grain yield, but the straw yield was significantly influenced by cultivars, with the highest straw yield in Sukkha-3 (5.21 t ha-1). Similarly, SRI management practice also had significantly higher gross returns (NRs. 144652 ha-1), net return (NRs. 56647 ha-1) and B:C ratio (1.64:1). Thus, SRI management practice can be adopted as adaptation approach for obtaining higher productivity and profitability in central terai and similar agro-climatic regions of Nepal