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Diversification of smallholder rice-based cropping systems has the potential to increase cropping system intensity and boost food security. However, impacts on resource use efficiencies (e.g., nutrients, energy, and labor) remain poorly understood, highlighting the need to quantify synergies and trade-offs among different sustainability indicators under on-farm conditions. In southern coastal Bangladesh, aman season rice is characterized by low inputs and low productivity. We evaluated the farm-level impacts of cropping system intensification (adding irrigated boro season rice) and diversification (adding chili, groundnut, mungbean, or lathyrus) on seven performance indicators (rice equivalent yield, energy efficiency, partial nitrogen productivity, partial potassium productivity, partial greenhouse gas footprint, benefit-cost ratio, and hired labor energy productivity) based on a comprehensive survey of 501 households. Indicators were combined into a multi-criteria performance index, and their scope for improvement was calculated by comparing an individual farmer's performance to top-performing farmers (highest 20%). Results indicate that the baseline system (single-crop aman season rice) was the least productive, while double cropped systems increased rice equivalent yield 72-217%. Despite gains in productivity, higher cropping intensity reduced resource use efficiencies due to higher inputs of fertilizer and energy, which also increased production costs, particularly for boro season rice. However, trade-offs were smaller for diversified systems including legumes, largely owing to lower N fertilizer inputs. Aman season rice had the highest multi-criteria performance index, followed by systems with mungbean and lathyrus, indicating the latter are promising options to boost food production and profitability without compromising sustainability. Large gaps between individual and top-performing farmers existed for each indicator, suggesting significant scope for improvement. By targeting indicators contributing most to the multi-criteria performance index (partial nitrogen productivity, energy efficiency, hired labor energy productivity), results suggest further sustainability gains can be achieved through future field research studies focused on optimizing management within diversified systems.Supplementary informationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13593-022-00795-3.

Rice cultivation in the Northwestern Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP) of India is often associated with high energy use, calling into question its sustainability. We applied a bootstrapped meta-frontier with a truncated regression to a database of 3,832 rice farms from the input-intensive rice production tracts of the Northwestern IGP as part of an assessment of energy use efficiency aimed at identifying entrypoints for more sustainable and efficient practices. District-specific technical efficiency score ranged between 0.68 and 0.99, with a mean of 0.86–0.90, suggesting an average potential for improvement in energy use efficiency of 10–14% within each district. Observed mean meta-frontier technical efficiency scores ranged between 0.60 and 0.81. On average, energy use efficient farms had 42% or higher energy use efficiency in the districts of Ambala, Fatehgarh Sahib, and Karnal. In contrast, in other districts efficient farms had 5-19% higher energy use efficiency than the inefficient farms. Higher rates of tillage, irrigation, and fertilizer application were identified among inefficient farms, with patterns of energy use efficiency varying to some extent between study districts. Both efficient and inefficient farms in Kapurthala and Ludhiana exhibited similar patterns of energy for tillage and land preparation, whereas the energy output from both efficient and inefficient farms were similar in Kurukshetra. These data suggest that in order to improve the efficiency of energy use in rice farms in the Northwestern IGP, district-level policy interventions and incentives might be required. The methodological approach and evidence provided in this study may be of use to identify pathways toward sustainable energy use in other intensively managed rice production landscapes in other countries. Similar analyses that employ meta-frontier and truncated regression approaches can be carried out for other performance indicators, for example profitability and carbon footprints, to explore and identify management and policy interventions to assist farmers to more appropriately utilize scarce and costly resources. [Display omitted] • Energy input – output data for 3832 farms used for energy-use efficiency assessment. • Bootstrapped data envelopment analysis and truncated regression identified energy-use efficiency drivers. • Mean district-specific technical efficiency score was 0.86–0.90 • Focusing on crop management is more important than socio-economic factors. • Policy planning should focus district wise inefficient rice production practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]