Farmers in the coastal zone of West Bengal depend mainly on agriculture but constrained with low productivity and hence low income. Productivity constraints attributed to prolonged water logging during and after the wet ( kharif ) season, soil salinity and the scarcity of low saline irrigation water as the dry ( rabi ) season progresses. Level of cropping intensification is very low (123%). Experiments were conducted during 2016–2019 at farmers’ field (90 farmers) in this coastal saline zone for finding suitable cropping intensification options. Several new cropping systems have been found feasible that can increase the cropping intensity to 200–300% while providing better income (2–5 times as compared to baseline). Besides, for better utilisation of scarce freshwater resource the vegetable–vegetable–vegetable cropping system was evolved successfully through solar powered drip irrigation system and low-cost drip irrigation system. Such cropping systems provided higher profitability as compared to the existing farming practices. The paper also highlighted various determinants that may influence the adoption of these new cropping systems by the farmers and the possible strategic options therein.

中文翻译：

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西孟加拉邦沿海盐灾地区小农户种植系统集约化的经济学：选择，挑战和决定因素

西孟加拉邦沿海地区的农民主要依靠农业，但生产力低下，收入低。生产力的限制归因于在潮湿（ kharif）季节期间和之后的长期水 涝 ，土壤盐分和作为干燥（ 狂犬病）的低盐灌溉水的 缺乏 ）季节进行。作物集约化水平很低（123％）。在2016-2019年期间，在该沿海盐渍区的农民田间（90名农民）进行了试验，以寻找合适的集约化耕种方案。已经发现几种新的种植系统是可行的，可以将种植强度提高到200-300％，同时提供更好的收入（比基准高2-5倍）。此外，为了更好地利用稀缺的水资源，通过太阳能滴灌系统和低成本滴灌系统成功发展了蔬菜-蔬菜-蔬菜种植系统。与现有的耕作方法相比，这种耕作系统提供了更高的盈利能力。