Conservation agriculture based integrated crop management sustains productivity and economic profitability along with soil properties of the maize-wheat rotation.

Field experiments were conducted to evaluate eight different integrated crop management (ICM) modules for 5 years in a maize-wheat rotation (M); wherein, ICM-'business-as-usual' (conventional flatbed maize and wheat, ICM-conventional raised bed (CT) maize and wheat without residues, ICM-conservation agriculture (CA)-based zero-till (ZT) flatbed maize and wheat with the residues, and ICM CA-based ZT raised bed maize and wheat with the residues. Results indicated that the ICM produced significantly (p < 0.05) the highest maize grain yield (5 years av.) which was 7.8-21.3% greater than the ICM. However, across years, the ICM gave a statistically similar wheat grain yield and was 8.4-11.5% greater than the ICM. Similarly, the CA-based residue retained ICM modules had given 9.5-14.3% (5 years av.) greater system yields in terms of maize grain equivalents (M) over the residue removed CT-based ICM. System water productivity (S) was the highest with ICM, being 10.3-17.8% higher than the ICM. Nevertheless, the highest water use (T) was recorded in the CT flatbed (ICM), ~ 7% more than the raised bed and ZT planted crops with or without the residues (ICM). Furthermore, the ICM had produced 9.54% greater variable production costs compared to the ICM, whereas, the ICM gave 24.3-27.4% additional returns than the ICM. Also, different ICM modules caused significant (p < 0.05) impacts on the soil properties, such as organic carbon (S), microbial biomass carbon (S), dehydrogenase (S), alkaline phosphatase (S), and urease (U) activities. In 0.0-0.15 m soil profile, residue retained CA-based (ICM) modules registered a 7.1-14.3% greater S and 10.2-17.3% S than the ICM. The sustainable yield index (S) of M was 13.4-18.6% greater under the ICM compared to the ICM Hence, this study concludes that the adoption of the CA-based residue retained ICMs in the M could sustain the crop yields, enhance farm profits, save water and improve soil properties of the north-western plans of India.