Agro-economic assessment of different sesame based intercropping system

A field experiment was conducted for agro-economic assessment of different sesame based intercropping systems at Agronomic Research Area, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan. The treatments were sesame alone, green gram alone, cowpea alone. single row of sesame+single row of green gram; two rows of sesame+single row of green gram; three rows of sesame+single row of green gram; single row of sesame+single row of cowpea; two rows of sesame+single row of cowpea and three rows of sesame+single row of cowpea. The results revealed that the different yield components of sesame were affected considerably by varying number of rows in intercropping. The maximum number of plants m^-2 (35.33), plant height (139.03 cm), number of pods per plant (32.20), 1000-seed weight (3.57 g), biological yield (4531.00 kg ha^-1), seed yield (900.53 kg ha^-1) and oil yield (455.21 kg ha^-1) were recorded where three rows of sesame was intercropped with single row of green gram while the highest Land equivalent ratio (1.31), net income Rs.77523 and benefit cost ratio (2.39) was attained where single row of sesame was grown with single row of green gram. Data predicted that single row of sesame grown in association with single row of green gram utilized the resources more efficiently than grown alone.