Wheat, mustard sowing starts at brisk pace

Sowing of the main rabi crops reached 6.47 mn hectares on Friday, a whopping 208% higher than the year-ago period

Even as rains continue to lash several parts of the country more than a month after a formal withdrawal of the southwest monsoon, farmers have started sowing rabi crops at a brisk pace to make utmost use of the soil moisture.

According to the latest data from the agriculture department, sowing of the main rabi crops, such as wheat, pulses and mustard, reached 6.47 million hectares on Friday, a whopping 208 per cent higher than the year-ago period.

"Sowing of rabi crops usually picks up pace after Diwali as farmers come back to the fields. This year it seems growers didn't even wait for festivals to get over to cash in on the excellent soil condition," said a senior agriculture ministry official.

He added that if the trend continues in the coming months, rabi foodgrain production could reach a record. This should augur well for the government as it battles to keep food inflation within manageable levels in an election year. According to Ashok Gulati, chairman of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP), wheat, gram (chana) and mustard production will hit a record this year because of good moisture residue. "Unlike kharif, the possibility of any damage to crops during the latter stages is less during rabi season and, hence, their production is more stable," Gulati told Business Standard. According to official data, wheat has been planted 415,000 hectares till Friday, compared with only 83,000 hectares in the same period last year.

The big jump has come from Madhya Pradesh, where 321,000 hectares have been planted against 2,000 hectares last year.

Wheat is sown on around 28 million hectares across the country during the entire rabi season. Punjab, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh are the leading growers. In pulses, gram has been a standout performer so far. The crop has been sown on 1.58 million hectares so far, while not a single hectare had been sown at this time last year. Mustard has been planted in 1.7 million hectares, 110 per cent more than last year. Officials said overflowing reservoirs and extraordinary rainfall in October had aided sowing.

Data from the Central Water Commission shows that water level in 85 major reservoirs across the country was 134.10 billion cubic centimetres, 122 per cent of last year's storage and 123 per cent of the 10-year average.

"Even if rains disappear in the next few weeks, there would be little impact as both groundwater and water in storage is at their record levels," explained the official.

Southwest monsoon in 2013 was around six per cent more than normal. However, since October 1 till date, India has received 128.6 centimetres of rainfall, which is 62 per cent more than normal.