Yield Response of Intercropped Soybean and Maize Under Rhizobia (Bradyrhizobium japonicum) Inoculation and P and K Fertilization

A 2-year trial was carried out at the Tanzania Coffee Research Institute (TaCRI) farm in northern Tanzania. The aim was to assess the response of soybean and maize yield attributes to cropping systems, rhizobia inoculation, and phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) fertilization. The study was laid out in a split-split plot design replicated thrice. The statistical analyses were performed using the 3-way analysis of variance in a factorial arrangement. The computation was performed using the STATISTICA software. The Fisher’s least significant difference (LSD) was used to compare the treatment means at p = 0.05 level of significance. The results showed that both cropping systems, rhizobia inoculation, and P and K fertilization significantly (p = 0.05) influenced most of the soybean yield parameters assessed in this study. Specifically, cropping systems significantly (p = 0.05) improved the number of pods per plant, biological yield, grain yield, and harvest index (HI) (2015 and 2016) of soybean. Rhizobia inoculation also significantly (p = 0.05) improved soybean yield attributes such as the number of pods, 100 seed weight, biological yield and grain yield of soybean (2015 and 2016), and HI in soybean (2015). P and K fertilization also significantly (p = 0.05) improved different yield attributes of soybean over the control. It was noted that increasing potassium from 20 to 40 kg/ha improved most of the soybean yield parameters relative to the control. Doubling of P from 26 kg to 52 kg/ha did not significantly change the soybean yield parameter. The doubled combined fertilizers did not significantly increase the yield parameters of soybean suggesting the use of a lower dose of combined fertilizers. Intercropping maize with rhizobia-inoculated soybean significantly improved maize yield compared with intercrop without inoculation. Monocropped maize gave relatively the same yield as those of maize intercropped with inoculated soybean. Fertilization with P and K also improved the yield attributes of maize over the control.