Books by Alok Kumar Patra

Weather and climate is a natural resource which is considered as a basic input in agricultural planning. It affects all the agricultural activities directly or indirectly. Agrometeorology is primarily concerned with the interactions among meteorological, hydrological and pedological factors that influence production systems in agriculture and allied sectors like horticulture, animal husbandry, fishery, forestry, etc. Thus the role of an agrometeorologist is to define all these interactions, to correlate physical environments with biological responses and apply the relevant meteorological skills to help farmers for exploiting weather conditions and improve agricultural production both in quality and quantity. In this backdrop, agrometeorology has been recommended as a core subject in the curriculum of B. Sc. (Agriculture), B. Sc. (Horticulture) and B. Sc. (Forestry) courses of the agricultural universities. Keeping this in view, this textbook has been written for the undergraduate students.

The importance of forest is now being realized in the backdrop of climate change, loss of biodiversity, and ecological and environmental imbalance. Thus, throughout the world, forestry is gaining importance as a subject of general interest and many universities have recommended it as a core subject in their curricula. Keeping this in view, this textbook Introductory Forestry has been written for the undergraduate students of agriculture as per the latest ICAR syllabus. The book has been divided into eight chapters covering major aspects of forestry including definitions of basic terms related to forestry, forest classification, Indian forest policies, forest regeneration, tending operations, forest mensuration, agroforestry and cultivation practices of some multipurpose tree species.

The origin of agroforestry practices, i.e. growing trees and shrubs with food and fruit crops and grasses is traditional and very old; but the science of agroforestry is new. Years of experience and experiments have shown that agroforestry as a land-use system is capable of yielding both food and wood and at the same time helps in conserving and rehabilitating the ecosystems. It has the capability to increase the overall productivity of land, maintain the nutrient balance in the soil and above all protect the nature. In the recent years, agroforestry has been recommended as a core subject in the curriculum of B. Sc. (Forestry) and B. Sc. (Agriculture) courses of the state agricultural universities. The book has been divided into ten chapters covering very comprehensive information on all aspects of agroforestry including history, concepts, systems classification, tree-crop interactions, planning and management, diagnosis and design, policy and projects, and propagation and management practices of multipurpose trees. 2020, 192pages, figures, tables, index, 25cmDr. Alok Kumar Patra has about 25 years of experience in research and teaching at UG and PG level on agroforestry and agrometeorology. Presently he is working as Professor (Agronomy) in the All India Coordinated Research Project on Integrated Farming Systems, Odisha University of Agriculture & Technology, Bhubaneswar- 751003, Odisha.