Different Methods of Potato Cultivation in India: Ridge and Furrow, Raised Bed, Drip, Zero Tillage, Mulching, Hill Planting and True Potato Seed

India grows potato by several methods, and the right one depends on soil, water, season and altitude. Ridge and furrow is the standard in the plains: ICAR-CPRI plants 30 to 50 g seed tubers 20 cm apart on ridges 50 to 60 cm apart, 8 to 10 cm deep, and earths up at 20 to 25 days. In an ICAR-CPRI Gwalior trial, drip on raised beds gave 35.8 t per ha, sprinkler on raised beds 33.7 and ridge-furrow with furrow irrigation 30.8 (bed shape and irrigation method changed together). On rice fallows in the Sundarbans, zero tillage under paddy straw averaged 32.0 t per ha across six straw and fertiliser treatments against 21.4 for ridges. Hill growers plant against the slope. True potato seed needs only about 150 g per ha but is not ready for farmers, and aeroponics is for seed producers.

Indian potato growers use ridge and furrow planting, raised beds with drip or sprinkler, zero tillage under paddy straw, mulching, contour planting on hill slopes and, rarely, true potato seed. Seed producers add tissue culture and aeroponics. Which one fits depends on soil, water, altitude and season.

The table below puts every method in one place, with the number that backs it. Each row is explained in its own section. The figures come from different sites and years, so read each row on its own and do not rank across rows.

For cost per acre, profit and a full fertiliser schedule, read our guide to potato farming cost per acre. This post stays on the method of growing.

In plains and low-lying areas, potato is a winter crop planted from October and grown to February. In hill areas the main crop goes in during February and March, and an autumn crop in August and September. ICAR-CPRI says planting time changes with altitude, so match the method to the window.

ICAR-CPRI Shillong gives a crop duration of 100 to 140 days from planting, depending on variety. Early varieties take 100 to 110 days, medium 110 to 120 and late more than 120. A rice-fallow system such as the Sundarbans one only works if the potato is out in time for the next crop, so a short-duration variety matters there.

Frost is the main risk for a crop that stands through December and January. Our frost protection guide covers the full canopy stage and the light irrigation step.

In ridge and furrow, you open furrows, place seed tubers in them and cover them with soil to form ridges. ICAR-CPRI calls it the most commonly used method in plains and terraces. Ridges drain water into the furrows and give the tubers loose soil to expand in.

ICAR-CPRI Shillong describes the working steps. Prepare the field with one pass of a soil-turning plough, two cross harrowings and levelling. Mix fertiliser and farmyard manure into the soil at land preparation. Form ridges 50 to 60 cm apart and place seed 20 to 30 cm apart, depending on tuber size. Planting can be done with a tractor or by hand with a spade.

At 60 x 20 cm the field carries about 83,000 plants per ha, or about 33,700 per acre (calculated). The Gwalior trial used the same 60 x 20 cm spacing for its ridge-furrow plots, with furrow irrigation every 12 to 15 days and the second half of the nitrogen given at hoeing and earthing up 26 days after planting.

The weak point of the method is water. Furrow irrigation uses a lot of it, and ICAR-CPRI says nutrient use efficiency under furrow irrigation is only 30 to 50% for nitrogen, 10 to 20% for phosphorus and 40 to 50% for potassium. That is the main reason scientists push micro-irrigation, covered below.

In a flat or paired-row bed, the field stays level and two or three rows go on a wide bed instead of single rows on ridges. ICAR-CPRI trials on seed potato favour paired-row beds, but they also use more plants per hectare. No Indian trial comparing an open flat bed with ridges for table potato was found.

At ICAR-CPRI Jalandhar, a two-season trial (2018-19 and 2019-20) on seed potato found that paired-row bed planting raised tuber yield by 21.7% and benefit:cost ratio by 18.6% over conventional planting geometry, mainly when haulms were cut after 80 to 90 days. A three-year ICAR-CPRI Gwalior trial on Kufri Khyati (Indian Journal of Agricultural Sciences, 2024) compared ridge and furrow at 60 x 20 cm with flat paired-row beds 90 cm wide. Seed-size tubers rose from 18.11 t per ha on ridges to 30.70 t per ha on a three-row flat bed, and a two-row bed cut at 80 days gave the best benefit:cost ratio, 2.51.

Read these figures with care. In the Gwalior trial the ridge control carried 83,333 plants per ha, the two-row bed 111,111 and the three-row bed 166,667, so the beds also needed more seed (37.5 q per ha for the control, 50 and 75 q for the beds). These were seed crops cut early at 70 or 80 days, not table-potato crops grown to full maturity, and the gain is mixed up with plant density. They show that bed planting can pay for seed growers. They do not show that a flat bed beats ridges for a ware crop.

For foreign context only, a USDA-ARS study in Idaho (USDA ARS, 2011) found that a five-row raised bed gave 6% higher yield with 5% less irrigation water than ridged rows across 62 commercial fields. That is US machine-planted, sprinkler-irrigated potato, so it is not an Indian recommendation.

Plain Reading: If your soil is light and well drained, ridges are fine and cheap and are what ICAR-CPRI recommends for the plains. Bed planting has Indian evidence mainly for seed crops and for drip or sprinkler irrigation. Do not assume a fully flat field with no ridges will match ridges for table potato; no Indian trial in this review showed that.

Raised-bed planting puts two rows on a wide, flat-topped bed and uses drip or sprinkler irrigation. At ICAR-CPRI Gwalior, 120 cm beds with two rows 40 cm apart under drip gave 35.8 t per ha, against 30.8 t per ha for ridge-furrow with furrow irrigation, over two seasons.

The Gwalior trial (Potato Journal, 2024) was on silty clay loam and used Kufri Jyoti planted in the first week of November in 2020 and 2021 and harvested in the second week of February. Ridge-furrow plots were 60 x 20 cm, irrigated every 12 to 15 days. Raised-bed plots were 120 cm wide with two rows 40 cm apart and 20 cm between plants, irrigated every 2 to 3 days by drip or sprinkler. Fertiliser doses and crop sequences were also tested, so these are the irrigation-method means across those treatments. Because the bed shape and the irrigation method changed together, the trial cannot say how much of the gain came from each.

Note the plant population. A 60 x 20 cm ridge and a 120 cm bed with two rows at 20 cm gaps both come to about 83,000 plants per ha (calculated), so the gain here is not from planting more seed. It comes from the bed shape and how water and nutrients were delivered. Drip also gave the highest share of large tubers (over 76 g) and the highest harvest index, 72%, against 63% for ridge-furrow.

One more honest point. Drip plots had slightly more cracked tubers (11.9% against 9.0% for ridge-furrow), though the paper calls the difference non-significant. And the trial is one site with one variety. Run your own strip before changing the whole farm.

Drip delivers water and nutrients near the roots in small, frequent doses. ICAR-CPRI scientists say micro-irrigation can save 40 to 50% of irrigation water and, with fertigation, about 25% of the NPK dose compared with furrow irrigation. Potato is shallow-rooted, so it responds well.

The ICAR-CPRI review in Indian Farming (May 2024) gives these benefits for micro-irrigation over furrow irrigation. Treat them as ranges from many studies.

The same review gives a working schedule. Under drip, apply one third of the nitrogen as basal and the remaining two thirds in eight splits, through the drip line twice a week up to 50 days after planting, starting at emergence. Irrigate on alternate days at 125% of cumulative pan evaporation. An interval of more than three days can cause moisture stress. For sprinkler, twice a week at 150% of cumulative pan evaporation gave the best yield. The review says the 'critical' stages are stolon formation and tuber initiation, and that losing more than 50% of available soil moisture then costs yield.

Fertigation needs a fertiliser that dissolves fully, because granular products can block emitters. Our comparison of water-soluble and granular fertiliser explains when each pays off. ICAR-CPRI also names potassium nitrate and potassium sulphate as potassium sources, and prefers potassium sulphate for processing potatoes. The NPK fertilizer collection groups the water-soluble grades; read the label and match the dose to a soil test.

For a potato-named biological package that goes through the drip line, Katyayani lists a potato drip kit of six biological products (NPK bio consortia, Trichoderma, mycorrhiza, Metarhizium, seaweed extract and zinc solubilising bacteria). Use it only as a soil-health add-on to the nutrient plan above, not as a replacement for it.

Zero tillage potato means planting tubers straight into moist rice-fallow soil with no ploughing, then covering them with paddy straw. It saves land preparation, conserves moisture and let a Sundarbans farmer plant earlier. ICAR-CSSRI measured an average of 32.0 t per ha across six zero-tillage treatments against 21.4 t per ha for conventional ridges.

The ICAR-CSSRI Canning Town study (J. Indian Soc. Coastal Agric. Res., 2024) ran on farm at Gosaba island, Sundarbans, in 2018-19 and 2019-20. Kufri Pukhraj went in during the first week of December on wet soil after rice, with tubers at 10 to 15 cm hill to hill and 30 to 35 cm row to row. Tubers were covered with dry compost or farmyard manure at 5 t per ha, then NPK, then a straw layer. Harvest was from the end of February to the first week of March.

The 32.0 t per ha is an average over treatments that differed in straw thickness and fertiliser method. A 15 cm layer (about 9 t of straw per ha) with broadcast fertiliser gave a yield only on par with conventional tillage in the first year (22.4 against 21.5 t per ha), while thicker layers (20 and 25 cm, about 12 and 15 t per ha) and foliar nutrient sprays did better. The authors say mulch thicker than 15 cm is essential for the full benefit. The fertiliser dose in the study was 100:75:75 kg N, P2O5 and K2O per ha.

The International Potato Center reports the same approach with more than 1,400 farmers in North and South 24 Parganas. It says the straw conserves moisture, suppresses weeds and softens temperature swings, and that the method suits areas with salty soil and water or waterlogged fields. It also lists open problems: costly seed brought from far away, rodents, mechanisation and a need for earlier-maturing varieties.

Where this works: rice fallows with leftover soil moisture and straw on hand. Where it does not: dry fields with no residual moisture and no straw. The ICAR-CSSRI paper also notes that about 10 million ha of cultivable land stays fallow after kharif rice in eastern India, including 1.72 million ha in West Bengal and 1.22 million ha in Odisha, because of moisture and irrigation shortage. For crop planning after rice, see crop rotation examples and plans.

Yes, in some ways. Rice straw or plastic mulch laid after planting cut virus incidence by 36 to 44% in an ICAR-CPRI Jalandhar trial. But the effect on insects fades once the canopy closes, about four weeks after emergence, and yield did not change significantly at Jalandhar.

ICAR-CPRI Jalandhar planted Kufri Khyati on 13 October 2020 and applied mulches two weeks after planting, just before emergence. Treatments were paddy straw (chopped or whole) at 5 and 10 t per ha, silver reflective mulch, black plastic and an unmulched control.

Source: Potato Journal 48(1), 2021. Yield differences were not significant. The authors conclude that straw at 5 t per ha is enough, that doubling it to 10 t did not change aphid or whitefly landings, and that protection lasts at least four weeks from emergence or until canopy closure. They suggest mulching 1 to 2 m beyond the plant line, because insects land first at field edges.

In short: mulch is a good fit if aphid-borne virus is your concern, if weeds are costly to pull, or if moisture is short. It is an extra cost and job if none of those apply. Our guide to mulching types, depth and mistakes covers how to lay straw and plastic; it does not mention potato, so use the ICAR numbers above for the crop.

On slopes, farmers open furrows across the slope, not up and down it, to hold soil and water. ICAR-CPRI Shillong advises furrows against the slope 50 cm apart, seed 20 to 25 cm apart, covered with soil into ridges 8 to 10 cm high. The crop is mostly rainfed.

ICAR-CPRI Shillong reports that in hill areas the summer crop is planted in February to March and the autumn crop in August to September. For field preparation on slopes, it says to make ridge and furrow against the slope, 50 to 60 cm between rows, to avoid soil erosion.

The TNAU organic-potato page (TNAU Agritech) gives a slightly different pattern, which is regional and not an error. It lists hill planting seasons and terraces, and uses ridges 45 cm apart with tubers 20 cm apart, 3,000 to 3,500 kg of seed per ha (disease-free, well-sprouted tubers of 40 to 50 g), a drainage channel along the inner edge of terraces, and an organic-crop yield of 15 to 20 t per ha over about 120 days. For cyst nematode it points to the resistant variety Kufri Swarna. The same page says not to grow potato in the same field year after year and to rotate with vegetables and green manure.

The 8.56 t per ha is the average for the whole north east, not a result of hill planting. ICAR-CPRI links the low yield to traditional methods, imbalanced fertiliser, old degenerated seed from outside the region and weather, against a national average of 25.79 t per ha. The practical lesson for hill growers: fresh, certified seed and balanced fertiliser likely matter more than any change in layout.

True potato seed is botanical seed from the potato berry. It needs only about 150 g per ha, against 2.5 to 3.0 t of seed tubers, and carries no tuber-borne disease. But ICAR-CPRI scientists say late maturity, unreliable germination and uneven tubers have stopped farmer adoption.

The idea was proposed by Dr S. Ramanujam in 1949. ICAR-CPRI developed three TPS populations in the 1980s: HPS-I/13, TPS-C-3 and 92-PT-27. The 2022 review by ICAR-CPRI authors in Frontiers in Agronomy lists the advantages as disease- and pest-free planting material, easy storage and transport, and a much smaller seed rate. It also says TPS is still not a ready-to-use technology, because a TPS-versus-tuber cost comparison in the cropping system is still missing.

Why it matters: the review says seed alone takes 40 to 50% of the total cost of potato production. That is what keeps researchers working on TPS. The new interest since 2008 is in diploid F1 hybrid TPS, which could give uniform crops from seed, but the review says several challenges remain before it reaches farmers' fields.

A TPS crop can be raised two ways: seedlings from a nursery bed transplanted to the field, or seedlings grown to small seedling tubers that are planted as seed the next season. No sowing date or nursery spacing is given here, because no opened ICAR source stated them. Check with ICAR-CPRI or your KVK before trying it.

Aeroponics grows disease-free potato plants with their roots hanging in air and fed by a nutrient mist. ICAR-CPRI uses it to produce minitubers for seed, not table potatoes. One in-vitro plant gives 40 to 50 minitubers, against 8 to 10 in nethouse beds.

The Frontiers review explains the set-up. Healthy tissue-culture plants are planted on top of a chamber inside an insect-proof nethouse, and the roots below are fogged with nutrient solution. Picking starts 45 to 50 days after planting, when tubers are 3 to 10 g, and continues weekly for 10 to 12 harvests over a 4 to 5 month season. Harvested minitubers are stored at 2 to 4 degrees C for the next season. The review says the system needs a high level of specialist planning and operating cost, but gives quality seed.

The same review says about 30% of breeders' (basic) seed in India now comes from these hi-tech methods, and that 70% of seed production still goes through the conventional system. The start-up cost is high; the review says it can be recovered after three to four crop seasons. For you as a grower, the useful point is simple: ask where your seed came from, and buy certified seed. Our cost-per-acre guide covers seed quantity and price.

Choose by your constraint. Ridge and furrow suits most plains fields with furrow irrigation. Raised beds with drip suit water-short or fertigation-ready farms. Zero tillage under straw suits rice fallows. Hill planting follows the slope. Mulch helps where aphids, weeds or dry spells hurt. TPS and aeroponics are not for table-potato farmers.

This table is our reading of the sources above. It is not an ICAR recommendation, and no single trial tested all of these methods on the same farm.

Seed size and spacing change with the method and the variety. ICAR-CPRI uses 30 to 50 g tubers at 60 x 20 cm in plains, which needs 2.5 to 3.0 t per ha. Hill, bed and zero-tillage systems use different row widths, so check the table before ordering seed.

ICAR-CPRI Shillong also advises dipping seed tubers in 3% commercial-grade boric acid for 25 to 30 minutes against dry rot, then drying them in shade. The same solution can be reused about 20 times. Follow current CIB&RC guidance before using any chemical treatment. Seed rate also moves with tuber size: seed of about 25 g at closer spacing needs fewer quintals per acre than the 30 to 50 g tubers ICAR-CPRI uses, which is why different sources quote different rates.

The method changes when you give fertiliser more than how much. In ridge and furrow, half the nitrogen and all phosphorus and potash go in at planting, and the rest goes in at earthing up. Under drip, one third of nitrogen goes basal and the rest is split through the line.

These doses differ because the sites, varieties and yield targets differ. Soil test first. The ICAR-CPRI review notes that a healthy crop removes about 4.60 kg of K2O per tonne of tubers, which is about 170 to 230 kg K2O per ha, and that potassium uptake is highest between 30 and 60 days after planting in the plains. It also lists soil, spray and tuber-soak doses for micronutrient correction, including zinc sulphate at 25 kg per ha to the soil or 200 g per 100 litres as a spray, only where soil or tissue tests show a need.

Biological inputs can fit this plan. The Gwalior trial included one treatment with FYM 7.5 t per ha, crop residue 7.5 t per ha and Azotobacter and phosphate-solubilising bacteria. It had the lowest cost of cultivation (Rs 1,41,600 per ha) but also a lower yield (29.1 t per ha against 31.1 t per ha for the full chemical dose). Browse the bio fertilizer collection for the range.

Earthing up and irrigation timing follow the plant, whatever the layout. ICAR-CPRI says to earth up at 20 to 25 days when plants are 8 to 10 cm tall, irrigate first at 8 to 10 days, and avoid moisture stress at stolon formation and tuberization. Mulched and drip systems reduce how often you do each.

Key timings from ICAR-CPRI Shillong and the ICAR-CPRI water review:

• First irrigation 8 to 10 days after planting for quick, even emergence.
• Second irrigation 21 to 25 days after planting, just after earthing up.
• Later irrigations every 10 to 12 days on light soils and 12 to 14 days on medium soils, under furrow irrigation.
• Keep available soil moisture in the root zone between 65 and 85% during active growth; stolon formation to tuber development are the critical stages.
• Under conventional furrow irrigation, crop water need varies from 300 to 600 mm in Indian conditions.
• Stop irrigation 10 to 12 days before harvest in an early crop, or before haulm cutting in a main crop when 40 to 50% of plants show senescence.
• Cut haulms 15 to 20 days before harvest so the tuber skin sets.

For weeds, ICAR-CPRI Shillong gives a pre-emergence herbicide within 3 to 7 days of planting in moist soil, followed by manual weeding at about 45 days. Check the current label and CIB&RC registration before choosing a product. Mulch and zero-tillage straw reduce weed pressure on their own, as CIP notes.

Late blight does not depend on the method, but wet foggy spells can hit any layout. Our potato late blight control calendar covers the spray timing and forecasting tools.

Reported yields range from 8.56 t per ha as the north east average to about 40 t per ha in the best ICAR-CPRI trial plot. They are not comparable across rows, because variety, site, year and inputs differ. India's average was 23.77 t per ha in 2019-20.

How to read this. A trial plot gets better care than a farm field, so expect your own number to be lower. The ICAR-CPRI authors also note that India's productivity gap, against the national figure, is mostly about seed quality and management, not only layout. The Gwalior numbers show that improving irrigation and nutrient delivery moved yield by about 5 t per ha on the same variety; that is the realistic size of the gain from a method change.

For cost per acre, seed rate and the profit sum at your local price, use our potato farming cost per acre guide and do the sum with your own numbers.

Start with a small strip, not the whole farm. Confirm soil type and drainage, water source and pump timing, straw or mulch supply, certified seed and, for drip, a fertiliser that dissolves fully. Then compare yield, water use and labour on the strip with your usual ridges.

• Soil: ICAR-CPRI Shillong names well-drained, levelled, fertile loam with neutral to slightly acidic reaction as best.
• Temperature: optimum for tuber growth is 10 to 30 degrees C (ICAR-CPRI Shillong).
• Seed: 30 to 50 g tubers with thick 0.5 to 1.0 cm sprouts; use certified seed (ICAR-CPRI Shillong).
• Water: drip needs frequent irrigation, and ICAR-CPRI says gaps of more than three days can stress the crop, so check that you can run the pump on time.
• Straw: for zero tillage, plan the 12 to 15 t per ha that the thicker mulch layers used in the ICAR-CSSRI trial.
• Rotation: do not grow potato in the same field every year (TNAU); see our crop rotation guide, which warns against planting tomato after potato because of shared diseases.
• Record keeping: note planting date, input cost, number of irrigations, harvest weight in large, medium and small grades (above 75 g, 25 to 75 g, under 25 g, the ICAR-CPRI grading).

Do not switch several things at once. If you change to drip, mulch and a new variety together, you will not know which one worked.

Conclusion

There is no single best method of potato cultivation in India. Ridge and furrow remains the standard in the plains, and ICAR-CPRI gives clear numbers for it: 30 to 50 g seed at 60 x 20 cm, 8 to 10 cm deep, earthed up at 20 to 25 days. The trials that moved yield most were about water and bed shape, with drip on raised beds at 35.8 t per ha against 30.8 for ridge-furrow at Gwalior, and zero tillage under straw at an average of 32.0 against 21.4 t per ha in the Sundarbans. Mulch protects against early virus, hill growers should plant across the slope, and true potato seed and aeroponics belong to seed programmes. Pick the method that fixes your own constraint, test it on a strip, and keep records before you scale.