Need to align govt, trade bodies output figures: Agri Min

The Agriculture Ministry today expressed concern over the wide variation in production estimates of government and trade bodies, particularly for sugarcane and cotton, and stressed that urgent steps are needed to give authentic forecasts for policy formulation.

"The issue of wide variations in the area and production estimates of crops over successive advance and final estimates continues to be a cause of concern," Ministry of Agriculture Principal Adviser K V Krishnan said at the national workshop on 'Improvement of Agricultural Statistics'.

Noting that several other agencies have started providing production estimates for various crops, he said although such assessments do help validate estimates, they create confusion in the minds of policymakers if they differ significantly.

Pointing out the variations in the estimates of sugar and cane production in 2009-10, Krishnan said, "The variation in the estimates of cane leads to serious problems in planning for import and export of sugar, besides creating doubts on the reliability of estimates in the minds of other users."
    
Similarly, there is variation in the government estimates of cotton production as compared to the assessment of trade bodies. "This problem is probably due to practical difficulty in capturing all the pickings of cotton in estimation of yield via crop cutting experiments," he said in a statement.
    
"We need to take measures to address this problem and arrive at a methodology for realistic assessment of cotton production in the country to enable proper policy formulation for its import and export," Krishnan said.
    
He asked the Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute (IASRI) to fasten the process to develop new methodology to estimate cotton production from next year.
    
Stressing on the need to improve the statistical data on horticultural crops, he said this sector can become a key driver in stimulating the overall growth of the agriculture sector.