Bumper paddy production puts next plan on hold in Chhattisgarh

The paddy production in Chhattisgarh in the kharif season 2012 recorded a new height. But the state government officials are in a fix.

For, the bumper paddy production in the Chhattisgarh had confused them to fix the target for the kharif season 2013. The department of agriculture prepared the report with productivity target for the year. But it had to put the report on hold when the final figure of paddy production for 2012-13 was released.

Known as rice-bowl of the country, the paddy production in Chhattisgarh touched the figure of 11.7 million tonne (MT). The state government had set the target to produce 9 MT of paddy last year. The final result was however surprisingly for them with about 25 per cent higher production.

The agriculture department had predicted a productivity of 1,750 kilogram of paddy per hectare for the kharif season 2012. The yield exceeded the target and the state produced on average 2,050 kilogram of paddy in a hectare of land. The end result was 300 kilogram higher than the target.

"We had set the productivity target of 2000 kilogram for the kharif 2013 initially but now had to revise the figure," Chhattisgarh's agriculture minister Chandrashekhar Sahu told Business Standard. There was a bid of confusion as to what target should be set but it would be anyway more than last year's target, he added.

The officials and agriculture scientists first thought of increasing the productivity target to 2,200-2,300 kilogram per hectare for kharif season 2013 keeping in view the productivity of 2050 kilogram per hectare achieved in kharif 2013. They however dropped the proposal and decided to keep it to 2,000 kilograms, which is more than last year's target of 1,750 kilogram per hectare.

"The agriculture condition in the kharif season 2013 could not be the same and hence it would not be fair to fix higher target based on this year's production," the minister said. Hence the state government maintained restrains while setting the agriculture production target for this year, he added.

Even experts feel that the productivity for future cannot be predicted. "Especially when the irrigation potential in the state is hardly 30 to 40 per cent," said Sanket Thakur, agriculture scientist.

The buoyant monsoon that the state received last year had resulted in bumper production of paddy in Chhattisgarh. The state produced 6.7 MT of rice as against the target of 6.5 MT.

That resulted in the heavy inflow of paddy in the procurement centres set by the state government to purchase the yield from the farmers at the minimum support price.

Chhattisgarh had created a record by procuring over 7.12 MT of paddy worth Rs 11,000 in the kharif marketing season 2012-13. This was about 1.1 MT higher than last year's figure of paddy procured.

The bumper crop had even miscalculated the financial experts of the state planning. As the state would be going to the polls in November this year, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government had planned to give bonus to the farmers selling paddy at the government-run societies at the minimum support price.

The government worked on paying a bonus of Rs 270 for a quintal of paddy assuming that the paddy production would not exceed 6.5 MT. The figure cross 7.1 MT and the state exchequer had to bear an additional burden of Rs 1,900 crore to pay bonus to the farmers.