OPSC AAO flashcards
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- Kharif season
- Rain-fed cropping season from June to October in India, dominated by rice, jute, groundnut, and maize, since sowing depends on the southwest monsoon rainfall.
- Rabi season
- Winter cropping season from October to March, generally irrigated, with wheat, gram, mustard, and potato as the main crops in most Indian states.
- Cropping intensity
- Gross cropped area divided by net sown area, multiplied by 100. Values above 100 show that land grows more than one crop in a year.
- Net sown area
- Land sown with crops once during the agricultural year, counted only once regardless of how many seasons it is cultivated.
- Gross cropped area
- Total area sown in all seasons added together, so land cropped twice in a year is counted twice in this measure.
- Cost A1
- All paid-out costs in farm production, including hired labour, seed, fertilizer, irrigation charges, and depreciation, but excluding rent and family labour.
- Cost C
- Comprehensive cost concept that adds the imputed value of family labour and interest on owned capital to Cost B in the CACP cost series.
- Marginal holding
- Operational holding of less than one hectare. Such holdings are numerous in India and constrain mechanisation and credit access.
- Economic threshold level
- Pest population density at which control measures are justified because further increase would cause damage exceeding the cost of control.
- Economic injury level
- Lowest pest density that causes crop loss equal to the cost of control; it is the theoretical basis for setting economic threshold levels.
- Integrated pest management
- Combining cultural, mechanical, biological, and need-based chemical methods to keep pest populations below economic threshold while limiting pesticide harm.
- Biofertilizer
- Preparation containing living microbes such as Rhizobium or Azotobacter that fix nitrogen or solubilise phosphorus, supplementing chemical fertilizer rather than replacing it.
- Green manuring
- Growing a leguminous crop such as dhaincha or sunhemp and ploughing it into the soil while green to add organic matter and nitrogen.
- Cation exchange capacity
- Soil's capacity to hold exchangeable cations on clay and organic matter surfaces, governing nutrient retention and lime requirement; it rises with clay and organic matter.
- Saline soil
- Soil with high soluble salt content and high electrical conductivity but normal exchangeable sodium, managed by drainage and salt-tolerant crops.
- Sodic soil
- Soil with high exchangeable sodium percentage, poor structure, and high pH, reclaimed by applying gypsum and leaching the displaced sodium.
- Nitrification
- Microbial conversion of ammonium to nitrite and then nitrate in aerated soil, making nitrogen mobile and available but also prone to leaching loss.
- Denitrification
- Anaerobic microbial reduction of nitrate to nitrogen gases in waterlogged soil, a major pathway of nitrogen loss from flooded paddy fields.
- Urea nutrient content
- Urea contains about 46 percent nitrogen, the highest among common solid nitrogen fertilizers, and is split-applied because it leaches and volatilizes.
- DAP fertilizer
- Diammonium phosphate, containing about 18 percent nitrogen and 46 percent P2O5, used mainly as a basal phosphorus source for field crops.
- Delta and duty
- Delta is total depth of irrigation water applied over a base period; duty is irrigated area per unit canal discharge, and delta equals 8.64 times base period divided by duty.
- Drip irrigation
- Method delivering water slowly at the plant root zone through emitters, achieving the highest application efficiency and suiting horticulture and water-scarce areas.
- Minimum Support Price
- Price announced by the Government of India, on CACP recommendation, to protect farmers from price crashes and assure procurement of notified crops.
- Price spread
- Difference between the price paid by the consumer and the price received by the producer, reflecting marketing costs and margins of intermediaries.
- Marketable surplus
- Production minus on-farm consumption, seed retention, and other retentions; it is the quantity actually available for sale in the market.
- Break-even output
- Output level at which total revenue equals total cost, computed as fixed cost divided by the difference between unit price and unit variable cost.
- Law of diminishing returns
- As more units of a variable input are added to fixed factors, marginal product eventually declines, defining the rational stage of production.
- Vernalization
- Cold treatment required by some crops such as wheat to induce or hasten flowering; it is a physiological requirement distinct from photoperiod response.
- C4 photosynthesis
- Pathway that concentrates carbon dioxide before fixation, giving crops such as maize, sorghum, and sugarcane higher water-use efficiency and yields under heat.
- Hybrid vigour
- Superior performance of the first filial generation over its parents, exploited in cross-pollinated crops like maize; vigour declines in later generations.
- Certified seed
- Seed class produced from foundation seed and certified for genetic purity and quality, normally the class sold to farmers for commercial cultivation.
- Result demonstration
- Extension method that shows a proven practice applied in a farmer's own field so neighbours can see the outcome under local conditions.