Rain ups acreage in paddy & coarse cereals

Continuous good rains over northern, eastern and western parts of the country in August have helped maintain the rising trend of acreage in paddy. Also, coarse cereals have regained much of the ground lost due to weak monsoon in June and July.

But, this cannot be said about pulses and oilseeds. According to the ministry of agriculture, the acreage under paddy till August 24 was 1.03 million hectares more than normal acreage (average of last five years).

The shortfall in area under coarse cereals when compared with the normal acreage has also narrowed down from three million hectares during the week ended August 17 to 2.89 million hectares during the week ended August 24.

CULTIVATION CHART
Crop	Acreage*	Normal area#	Change**
Rice	32.91	31.88	1.03
Coarse cereals	16.53	19.42	-2.89
Pulses	8.83	9.93	-1.1
Oilseeds	16.42	16.38	0.04
Sugarcane	5.28	4.67	0.61
Cotton	11.15	10.57	0.57
Jute	0.87	0.9	-0.02
Total kharif	92.03	93.77	-1.74
* Till Aug 24; # Average of last five years for the same period; ** In million hectares Source: Department of Agriculture

In pulses, the shortfall remained almost similar during the period. Till August 24, pulses were sown in around 8.83 million hectares, 1.18 million hectares less than the normal.

In oilseeds, too, the rise in acreage remained almost the same at 45,000 hectares during the week ended August 24 compared with the previous week.

Officials said, as the kharif sowing season nears its end, the big challenge would be to bring the normal area under plantation in all crops. “This would ensure that even if we don’t have bumper harvest, at least reasonable production is achieved,” a senior official said.

Total sowing of kharif is around 13 per cent less than the normal area, with major losses being in coarse cereals, pulses and oilseeds.

“Pulses and coarse cereals are alternative crops and their sowing can continue till even first week of September, mainly in southern and western India, where monsoon is not always followed by winters as in north,” said Prof Ramesh Chand, director of National Centre For Agricultural Economics and Policy Research (NCAP).

Overall southwest monsoon from August 16 to August 22 was just two per cent below normal. Heavy showers have also narrowed down full seasonal deficiency to just 14 per cent below normal across the country.