**5. Conclusion**

Considering the importance of maize in cereal basket of the world, production sustainability is a prime concern. Maize is an exhaustive crop by nature that requires

**111**

**Author details**

Management, Odisha, India

Sagar Maitra\*, Tanmoy Shankar and Pradipta Banerjee

\*Address all correspondence to: sagar.maitra@cutm.ac.in

provided the original work is properly cited.

M.S. Swaminathan School of Agriculture, Centurion University of Technology and

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

*Potential and Advantages of Maize-Legume Intercropping System*

enough nutrient inputs to achieve target yield. Under small holders' practices in poor soil and fragile ecological conditions continuous growing of maize may create further depletion of soil nutrients causing a threat to production sustainability. In this regard, maize-legume intercropping system is considered a suitable option as it has enough potential to replenish the soil nutrients, produce more yield and economic benefit by utilizing limited resource, check damage caused by pests, diseases and weeds to a large extent, control soil erosion by covering ground and provide natural insurance to small holders under risky conditions against crop failure. Thus, in true sense, maize-legume intercropping system can boost yield as well as produc-

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.91722*

tion sustainability of the system as a whole.

## *Potential and Advantages of Maize-Legume Intercropping System DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.91722*

*Maize - Production and Use*

*3.2.2 Sustainability of the system*

**4. Limitations of intercropping**

combination, such incidences are not common.

leads to less evaporation loss of soil moisture. Under extreme conditions, may be due to either biotic or abiotic factors, a crop may fail, but there will be less chance of failure of more crops grown in intercropping, which are morphologically dissimilar and if so happened some yield and return will be earned to save small holders' economic interest. Thus stability in yield and return are achieved due to creation of crop diversity in the intercropping systems. In economic point of view, it may be stated that small farmers may face problem of seasonal price variability of commodities which often can destabilize net realization, but diversification in the form of intercropping can stabilize farm income to a great extent. Experimental results indicated superiority of intercropping maize-beans in soil fertility restoration and income enhancement than monocropping of the component crops [55]. Yield enhancement of crops is another basis to strengthen the economy of small and marginal farmers adopting intercropping system [56]. Though intercropping of maizegrain legumes is labour and cost intensive, small holders of central Mozambique prefer it because of reduced risk of crop failure and enhanced productivity [57].

Intercropping is now in the centre of attention targeting sustainability in agriculture. The negative impacts of industrialized and modern agriculture have already been realized and issues are very crucial in crop ecology to achieve sustainability. On the other side, maize-legume intercropping has enough potential in the form of more yields from limited resource, proper utilization of resources, and restoration of soil fertility, efficient pest management and creation of above and below ground diversity. In the moisture stress or resource poor conditions, intercropping provides natural insurance against crop failure caused by biotic and abiotic factors and thus ascertains economic stability of small holders. Considering the multiple advantages, it can be stated that maize-legume intercropping system is one of the suitable

Despite a number of benefits of maize-legume intercropping over monocropping, sometimes intercropping may exhibit some limitations especially in terms of agronomic management. In the field where farm mechanizations have been adopted, intercultural operations and harvest become difficult with two dissimilar crops. However, there is no problem where the intercrops are harvested for forage or grazed [13]. It may be mentioned that where human workforce is sufficient, particularly in developing countries, there is no need for investment in costly machines for agronomic management and harvest of crops in intercropping and in this regard intercropping does not express any disadvantages. Intercropping may cause yield loss of the base crop (maize) compared to its sole stand, but MEY become more and thus intercropping may be considered more productive than monoculture. Further in intercropping, crowded crop canopy may create a microclimate which may be congenial to spread of fungal pathogens, but in maize-legumes intercropping

Considering the importance of maize in cereal basket of the world, production sustainability is a prime concern. Maize is an exhaustive crop by nature that requires

options for achieving production sustainability for small holders.

**110**

**5. Conclusion**

enough nutrient inputs to achieve target yield. Under small holders' practices in poor soil and fragile ecological conditions continuous growing of maize may create further depletion of soil nutrients causing a threat to production sustainability. In this regard, maize-legume intercropping system is considered a suitable option as it has enough potential to replenish the soil nutrients, produce more yield and economic benefit by utilizing limited resource, check damage caused by pests, diseases and weeds to a large extent, control soil erosion by covering ground and provide natural insurance to small holders under risky conditions against crop failure. Thus, in true sense, maize-legume intercropping system can boost yield as well as production sustainability of the system as a whole.
