Concurrent agriculture is facing tremendous problems with dwindling natural resources and diversity, depletion of soil, water and air quality along with decreased factor productivity and net revenue. All these issues caused threats to the food, nutrition and livelihood security of the farmers as well as the human population of the world. The situation of small and marginal farmers in the developing countries is comparatively gloomy because of lesser investment capability of the farmers and adoption of subsistence farming. Moreover, global warming and climate change created another dimension into the problems..

Predominantly, an agrarian society is mostly dependent on the farm sector. Agriculture plays an important role in Indian economy notwithstanding its shrinkage in share in the gross domestic product (GDP) of the country being 55.4% in 1950-’51 and 17.4% in 2018-’19 (Tripathy, 2019). Still the agriculture and allied sector is providing employment to 54 percent of the Indian population.

The competitive relations among the cultivated crop species perform a relation and these are pronounced during the early growth period of the crops and during later phases. The crop’s performance is reflected into the yield output. Intercropping research so far conducted is based on the experimental layout of either replacement or additive series.

Agriculture is the mainstay of the economy in different developing countries and it is not only nourishing the population, but also contributing a major share in country’s gross domestic product (GDP). During the second half of the twentieth century and after, modern agriculture encouraged intensive cropping with high cost and consumption of fossil-fuel based energy. Yield enhancement was achieved by adoption of modern technologies, but that was at the cost of ecological unbalance.

During recent time, world agriculture is in search of sustainability in farming. However, it is tedious job for the developing countries because of poor input management and degradation of resources, ever-growing human population and increasing demand for food and livestock feed, and shrinkage of land and other natural resources.

Agriculture is an important factor for human civilization as it not only provides food, feed for the livestock, fibre, fuel and industrial raw material but also supports the livelihood of a wide range of world population. Besides, it shows its prominent presence in the economy of the developing countries. Being a developing country, agriculture is the largest sector in India where about 54% of the population is engaged. The growth of agriculture in India during last seven and half decades (after independence) is quite remarkable in terms of sufficient food-grains production as well as in achieving self-sufficiency in food production. The task to achieve it was not so easy.

Worldwide, agriculture contributes a lot for mankind by providing food and feed for human beings and livestock, respectively. The countries where agriculture plays a vital role, it has enough importance in the economy of the country as well as gross domestic product (GDP).

In the current situation, crop intensification is of topmost importance to increase agricultural production from ever-limiting and degrading resources. In this regard, the potential of agroforestry can be thought that offers ample opportunity to enhance farm output with multifaceted benefits (Xu et al., 2019). Forests are known to maintain ecological balance in many ways with greater ecosystem services; hence, the advantages of forestry can be included in agroecosystem in the form of agroforestry which enables yield of forest products and crops together

Enhancement of population is a global issue and the expected world population will be 9.7 billion in 2050 (UN, 2019). Under the situation, achievement of food and nutritional security is a major target with reduction of GHGs to the atmosphere and mitigation of ill effects of climate change. Modern agriculture is responsible for emission of GHGs in many ways and one of them is production of synthetic N fertilizer. There is no doubt about the fact that chemical N fertilizers enhance crop yield but it is at the cost of atmospheric equilibrium and agricultural sustainability cannot be achieved by this practice (Bedoussac et al. 2015; Layek et al., 2018).

Intercropping with food crops and vegetables is widely practiced by small and marginal farmers of the world mainly belonging to arid and semi-arid regions. Because of several benefits obtained, farmers prefer to adopt intercropping system. In temperate regions, mixed stands of cover crops and combinations of cereal and legumes forage production are very common.

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