Augmentation of maize yield by strategic adaptation to cope with climate change for a future period in Eastern India

The changing climate may adversely affect crop production unless appropriate adaptation strategies are used. The appropriate level of fertilization and sowing dates are some of the simple and most economic but effective strategies which can be developed and applied for specific climatic regions. Keeping the aforesaid fact in mind, varying sowing dates were analyzed as a strategic adaptation to cope with the climate change for maize yield in Eastern India under rainfed and irrigated conditions. Evaluation of sowing dates was performed by the CERES-maize model for estimating the maize yield for the projected time periods 2021–2050 (2050s), and 2051–2080 (2080s) by using different Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP) 2.6, 4.5, 6.0, and 8.5 W m-2 respectively from the 17 Global circulation models (GCM) of CMIP5 (Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5) climate projection scenarios, and the results projected were compared with the baseline scenario of 1982–2012. The results indicated that the effect of late sowing dates (30 June and 10 July) was more in RCPs 6.0, and 8.5 for both the time periods 2050s and 2080s as during the tasseling stage the intensity of solar radiation decreased, while for the recommended (20 June), and earlier sowing (30 May and 10 June) dates reduced grain yield was recorded for the rainfed condition due to higher temperature stress. In irrigated conditions, the recommended sowing date (15 January) was suitable for time slice 2050s in all the RCP scenarios, while the earlier sowing date (25 December) was found to be suitable in the time slice period of 2080s with RCP 8.5. Thus, shifting sowing dates can be an effective management strategy to cope with climate change with less waste and efficient use of resources.