Person: Mcdonald, Andrew
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Mcdonald
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Andrew
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Mcdonald, A.
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0000-0002-2660-3470 10 results
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- Influence of conservation agriculture-based production systems on bacterial diversity and soil quality in rice-wheat-greengram cropping system in eastern Indo-Gangetic Plains of India(Frontiers Media S.A., 2023) Kumar, R.; Choudhary, J.S.; Naik, S.K.; Mondal, S.; Mishra, J.S.; Poonia, S. P.; Saurabh, K.; Hansraj Hans; Kumar, S.; Das, A.; Kumar, V.; Bhatt, B.P.; Chaudhari, S.K.; Malik, R.; Craufurd, P.; Mcdonald, A.; Sherpa, Sonam
Publication - Conservation agriculture impacts in cereal-based cropping systems of South Asia: a meta-analysis(CIMMYT, 2021) Jat, M.L.; Chakraborty, D.; Ladha, J.; Dharamvir Singh Rana; Gathala, M.K.; Mcdonald, A.; Gerard, B.
Publication - Understanding decision processes in becoming a fee-for-hire service provider: a case study on direct seeded rice in Bihar, India(Elsevier, 2021) Brown, B.; Samaddar, A.; Singh, K.; Leipzig, A.; Anurag Kumar; Kumar, Pankaj; Singh, D.K.; Malik, R.; Craufurd, P.; Kumar, V.; Mcdonald, A.
Publication - Potential of conservation agriculture modules for energy conservation and sustainability of rice-based production systems of Indo-Gangetic Plain region(Springer, 2021) Nandan, R.; Poonia, S. P.; Sati Shankar Singh; Chaitanya Prasad Nath; Kumar, V.; Malik, R.; Mcdonald, A.; Hazra, K.K.
Publication - Designing profitable, resource use efficient and environmentally sound cereal based systems for the Western Indo-Gangetic plains(Nature Publishing Group, 2020) Jat, H.S.; Kumar, V.; Datta, A.; Choudhary, M.; Yadvinder-Singh; Kakraliya Suresh Kumar; Poonia, T.; Mcdonald, A.; Jat, M.L.; Sharma, P.C.
Publication - The conservation agriculture roadmap for India: policy brief(ICAR, 2018) Jat, M.L.; Biswas, A.K.; Pathak, H.; Mcdonald, A.; Patra, A.K.; Acharya, C.B.; Sharma, P.C.; Chaudhari, S.K.; Singh, R.; Bhaskar, S.; Sharma, R.; Jat, H.S.; Agarwal, T.; Gathala, M.K.; Pal, S.; Sidhu, H.S.; Yadvinder-Singh; Chhokar, R.S.; Keil, A.; Saharawat, Y.S.; Jat, R.K.; Singh, B.; Malik, R.; Sharma, A.R.; Parihar, C.M.; Das, T.K.; Singh, V.K.; Jat, S.L.; Jha, B.K.; Pratibha, M.; Singh, P.; Singh, R.C.; Choudhary, O.P.; Sharma, S.; Satyanarayana, T.; Sidhu, B.S.; Gehlawat, S.K.; Sen, S.K.; Singh, A.K.; Sikka, A.K.Agriculture remains central to the Indian economy, providing livelihood to the majority of its population. Though Indian agriculture have made spectacular progress for food self-sufficiency, yet growing challenges of large management yield gaps, low water and nutrient efficiency, imbalance and inadequate use of external production inputs, diminishing farm profits, deterioration of soil health and environmental quality coupled with climate risks are major concerns. Feeding a growing population with increasing dietary preferences for resource-intensive food products is a major challenge. Moreover, with no scope for horizontal expansion of farming to produce needed food; improving agronomic productivity and achieving high and stable yields under changing and uncertain climate are important for feeding the growing population. Increasing climatic variability affects most of the biological, physical and chemical processes that drive productivity of agricultural systems. The productivity and stability of agricultural systems depends upon measurable factors and processes controlled by climate and non-climate drivers of production paradigm. It is therefore vitally important to develop strategies and practices to sustainably increase food production while increasing farm income, protecting natural resources and minimizing environmental footprints.
Publication - Assessing soil properties and nutrient availability under conservation agriculture practices in a reclaimed sodic soil in cereal-based systems of North-West India(Taylor & Francis, 2018) Jat, H.S.; Datta, A.; Sharma, P.C.; Kumar, V.; Yadav, A.K.; Choudhary, M.; Choudhary, V.; Gathala, M.K.; Sharma, D.K.; Jat, M.L.; Yaduvanshi, N.P.S.; Singh, G.; Mcdonald, A.Soil quality degradation associated with resources scarcity is the major concern for the sustainability of conventional rice-wheat system in South Asia. Replacement of conventional management practices with conservation agriculture (CA) is required to improve soil quality. A field experiment was conducted to assess the effect of CA on soil physical (bulk density, penetration resistance, infiltration) and chemical (N, P, K, S, micronutrients) properties after 4 years in North-West India. There were four scenarios (Sc) namely conventional rice-wheat cropping system (Sc1); partial CA-based rice-wheat-mungbean system (RWMS) (Sc2); CA-based RWMS (Sc3); and CA-based maize-wheat-mungbean (Sc4) system. Sc2 (1.52 Mg m−3) showed significantly lower soil bulk density (BD). In Sc3 and Sc4, soil penetration resistance (SPR) was reduced and infiltration was improved compared to Sc1. Soil organic C was significantly higher in Sc4 than Sc1. Available N was 33% and 68% higher at 0–15 cm depth in Sc3 and Sc4, respectively, than Sc1. DTPA extractable Zn and Mn were significantly higher under Sc3 and Sc4 compared to Sc1. Omission study showed 30% saving in N and 50% in K in wheat after four years. Therefore, CA improved soil properties and nutrient availability and have potential to reduce external fertilizer inputs in long run.
Publication - Evaluation of long-term conservation agriculture and crop intensification in rice-wheat rotation of Indo-Gangetic Plains of South Asia: carbon dynamics and productivity(Elsevier, 2017) Samal, S. K.; Rao, K.K.; Poonia, S. P.; Kumar, R.; Mishra, J.S.; Prakash, V.; Mondal, S.; Dwivedi, S.K.; Bhatt, B. P.; Naik, S.K.; Choubey, A. K.; Kumar, V.; Malik, R.; Mcdonald, A.In the context of deteriorating soil health, stagnation of yield in rice-wheat cropping system (RWCS) across Indo- Gangetic plains (IGP) and environmental pollution, a long term field experiment was conducted during 2009–2016 taking four crop scenarios with conservation agriculture (CA), crop intensification and diversified cropping as intervening technology aiming to evaluate the sustainability of the systems. Scenario 1 (S1) represented conventional farmers’ practice of growing rice and wheat with summer fallow. In scenario 2 (S2) and scenario 3 (S3), legume crop was taken along with rice and wheat with partial CA and full CA, respectively. Conventional RWCS was replaced with rice-potato + maize- cowpea cropping system with partial CA in scenario 4 (S4). The S3 scenario registered highest total organic carbon (TOC) stock of 47.71 Mg C ha−1 and resulted in significant increase of 14.57% over S1 (Farmer’s practice) in 0–30 cm soil depth after 7 years of field trial. The S4 scenario having intensified cropping systems recorded lowest TOC of 39.33 Mg C ha−1 and resulted in significant depletion of 17.56% in C stock with respect to S3 in 0–30 cm soil depth. The TOC enrichment was higher in S2, S3 and S4 scenario in the surface soil (0–10 cm) compared to S1. At lower depth (20–30 cm), the TOC enrichment was significantly higher in S2 (12.82 Mg C ha−1) and S3 (13.10 Mg C ha−1 soil) over S1 scenario. The S2 and S3 scenario recorded highest increased allocation of TOC (3.55 and 6.13 Mg C ha−1) to passive pool over S1. The S2 (15.72 t ha−1), S3 (16.08 t ha−1) and S4 (16.39 t ha−1) scenarios recorded significantly higher system rice equivalent yield over S1 (10.30 t ha−1). Among the scenarios, S3 scenario had greater amount of total soil organic carbon, passive pool of carbon and higher system rice equivalent yield, thus, is considered the best cropping management practice to maintain soil health and food security in the middle IGP.
Publication - Sustainable wheat intensification in theeastern Indo-Gangetic Plains: CSISA’s approach to scaling zero-tillage wheat in Bihar(CIMMYT, 2016) Keil, A.; D’souza, A.; Mcdonald, A.
Publication - Sustainable crop intensification through surface water irrigation in Bangladesh? A geospatial assessment of landscape-scale production potential(Elsevier, 2017) Krupnik, T.J.; Schulthess, U.; Ahmed, Z.; Mcdonald, A.Changing dietary preferences and population growth in South Asia have resulted in increasing demand for wheat and maize, along side high and sustained demand for rice. In the highly productive northwestern Indo-Gangetic Plains of South Asia, farmers utilize groundwater irrigation to assure that at least two of these crops are sequenced on the same field within the same year. Such double cropping has had a significant and positive influence on regional agricultural productivity. But in the risk-prone and food insecure lower Eastern Indo-Gangetic Plains (EIGP), cropping is less intensive. During the dryer winter months, arable land is frequently fallowed or devoted to lower yielding rainfed legumes. Seeing opportunity to boost cereals production, particularly for rice, donors and land use policy makers have consequently reprioritized agricultural development investments in this impoverished region. Tapping groundwater for irrigation and intensified double cropping, however, is unlikely to be economically viable or environmentally sound in the EIGP. Constraints include saline shallow water tables and the prohibitively high installation and energetic extraction costs from deeper freshwater aquifers. The network of largely underutilized rivers and natural canals in the EIGP could conversely be tapped to provide less energetically and economically costly surface water irrigation (SWI). This approach is now championed by the Government of Bangladesh, which has requested USD 500 million from donors to implement land and water use policies to facilitate SWI and double cropping. Precise geospatial assessment of where freshwater flows are most prominent, or where viable fallow or low production intensity cropland is most common, however remains lacking. In response, we used remotely sensed data to identify agricultural land, detect the temporal availability of freshwater in rivers and canals, and assess crop production intensity over a three-year study period in a 33,750 km2 case study area in southwestern Bangladesh. We combined these data with georeferenced and temporally explicitly soil and water salinity information, in addition to relative elevation classifications, in order to examine the extent of winter fallows and low productivity rainfed cropland that could be irrigated by small-scale surface water pumps. Applying observations of irrigated crop sowing dates and yields from 510 wheat, 550 maize, and 553 rice farmers, we also modeled crop intensification production scenarios within the case study area. We conservatively estimate that at least 20,800 and 103,000 ha of fallow and rainfed cropland, respectively, could be brought into intensified double cropping using SWI. Scenario analysis indicates that if 25%–75% of the fallow or low-intensity land were converted to irrigated maize, national aggregate production could increase by 10–14% or 29–42%, respectively. Conversion to wheat would conversely boost national production by 9–10% or 26–31%. Irrigated rice is however unlikely to contribute >3%. In aggregate, these actions could generate between USD 36–108 million of revenue annually among farmers. Intensification therefore has important land use policy and food and income security implications, helping to rationalizei SWI investments. Crop choice, water resource allocation, and water governance will however remain crucial considerations for irrigation planners.
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