Abstract

Groundnut is one of the important commercial crops of the Madras State and it occupies nearly two million acres with an estimated production of one million tons of nuts in shell valued at nearly 33 crores of rupees. The area under groundnut has expanded phenomenally at the expense of other crops because of the ease of cultivation and the attractive monetary returns. Groundnut is grown pure and also extensively as a mixture with other cereals and pulses. The benefits of mixed cropping have been stressed by many agronomists. The practice is not new to the Indian ryot whose holding is small and a variety of crops is taken by resorting to judicious mixed cropping. However to get the best results out of mixed cropping subsidiary crops to be grown have to be chosen carefully to see that the components do not react adversely on each other.

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