CHARACTERIZATION OF WHEAT GROWING ARGO-ENVIRONMENT USING REMOTE SENSING AND GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM

In most of the Asia pacific countries wheat is being grown as a main cereal crop to meet the needs of food requirements. Information of wheat growing environment and mapping of different wheat growing environmental factors viz. soil, climate, hydrology (water quality, availability) etc. are of great importance for agricultural management and planning for higher production of wheat for national food security. Remote Sensing and geographic Information System (GIS) are the proven technology to characterize crop growing environment and operational for optimum land use planning to enhance agricultural production. In the present study an attempt has been made to characterize the wheat growing environment of Sirsa district of Haryana state, north-western India as a pilot study using Remote Sensing and GIS. The satellite data used for the present study is temporal IRS-P6: AWIFS data having 60 m spatial resolution for the Rabi crop season (January to early February 2004). Wheat crop acreage was assessed by complete enumeration digital classification method. Visual interpretation was followed for generation of soil map. Other thematic maps (Ground water depth and quality maps) were digitized using ARC GIS. Integration of all the thematic maps and analysis were carried out in ARC-GIS environment. In the study area, wheat cropped lands can be grouped into four classes depending on the yield per unit area- Wheat1 (40-50 q/ha); Wheat2 (30-40 q/ha); Wheat3 (20-30 q/ha) and Wheat 4 (<20q/ha). Wheat1 was found to grow on the Ghaggar River plain. Soils are clay loam to loam (Fine loamy Typic Haplustepts) and ground water quality is very good which is being used as irrigation through deep tube well. Whereas Wheat4 produces very low yield (<20q/ha) which is grown on sandy soils