Performance of rice variety Khowai in rainfed lowland of West Tripura district

Abstract

Rice is the staple food for entire population of Tripura. Though rice is cultivated in 58% of net cultivated area in Tripura but the production obtained is not sufficient to feed 42.85 lakhs people of the state. Less coverage of high yielding varieties, lack of knowledge on scientific package and practices of rice cultivation are the main hindrance in getting higher production of rice in the state. In view of this, KVK West Tripura carried out 50 nos. of Front Line Demonstration on high yielding Kharif rice var. khowai in 10 ha area in six selected village. The demonstration was conducted consecutively for two years. The average yield obtained from farmers field of the demonstrated variety Tripura Khowai was ranged from 5752 to 5770 kg ha-1, where as yield obtained from the local variety was 4361 kg ha-1 and 4283 kg ha-1 during kharif 2023 and 2024 respectively. The farmers of West Tripura district achieved higher net return and B C ratio by cultivating Khowai variety of rice in comparison to their local variety. The percent increase in yield of rice variety khowai ranges from 32.31% to 33.88% over the farmers own practices during both the year. The results clearly showed the beneficial impact of front line demonstrations over the farmers practices. Feedback of all the demonstrated farmers were recorded and the farmers showed their satisfaction and also expressed their desire to cultivate the khowai variety in near future. Many farmers from nearby villages who were present during the field day and crop cutting experiment program of khowai rice were highly convinced by seeing the potentiality of the variety. This khowai variety also showed it’s uniqueness by withstanding submergence during the flood that took place in August 2024 in Tripura. This unique characters of rice variety was also witnessed by the demonstrated farmers of the FLD program.