Scilight Press

Composting is one of the best ways to manage rice straw and reduce environmental pollution with added value to the soil. The experiment was conducted at Lovely Professional University, Punjab in the agriculture research field to study the effect of waste decomposers and effective microorganisms on composting of rice straw and evaluate the quality of compost in the rabi season (2021-22). The experiment was laid out in a split plot design (SPD) with 10 treatments and three replications. Treatment involved were: M₁ (main plot) – System of rice intensification (SRI) with 60:40:30 kg NPK/ha, M₂ – Conventional methods of rice cultivation (150:50:50 NPK/ha), S₁ (Sub-plot) – Rice straw (RS) alone, S₂ – Waste decomposer (WD) + RS, S₃  – Effective microorganisms (EM) + RS, S₄  – WD + EM + RS, S₅ – RS + soil, S₆ – WD + RS + soil, S₇ – EM + RS + soil and S₈ – WD + EM + RS + soil. The minimum C/N ratio was recorded in M₁ (10.32%) and S₄ (44.82%). The highest humic acid was observed in M₁ (9.90%) and S₄ (60.06%). M₁ (5.34%) and S₄ (58.2%) had the highest fulvic acid. The least CO₂ evolution was recorded in M₁ (5.71%) and S₄ (79.3%). This study suggested that the combined application of WD and EM with rice straw may be beneficial for increasing mineralization, shortening composting periods and promoting SRI farming methodology over conventional methods of rice cultivation.