Wheat sowing lags at 253.52 lakh ha so far

Wheat has been planted in 253.52 lakh hectare so far in the ongoing rabi season, slightly lower than the previous year, the agriculture ministry said Friday.

Besides wheat, sowing of other rabi crops such as rice, pulses, coarse cereals and oilseeds also lagged.

Rabi crops' sowing begins from October and harvesting from March. Wheat is the main crop of this season.

According to the latest sowing data released by the ministry, wheat acreage was marginally lower at 253.52 lakh hectare so far in the rabi season of 2018-19 crop year (July-June), compared with 257.47 lakh hectare in the same period last season.

Wheat was sown in 84.08 lakh hectare in Uttar Pradesh, 47.94 lakh hectare in Madhya Pradesh, 34.69 lakh hectare in Punjab, 24.04 lakh hectare in Haryana and 24.61 lakh hectare in Rajasthan so far this rabi season.

Pulses such as gram and green gram (moong) was also sown in lesser area at 136.25 lakh hectare so far in the rabi season, compared with 143.40 lakh hectare in the year-ago.

Oilseeds area remained flat at 72.53 lakh hectare as against 72.94 lakh hectare, while that of coarse cereals area was down at 40.26 lakh hectare as compared with 48.72 lakh hectare in the said period.

Rice area remained lower at 9.98 lakh hectare so far this rabi season, from 14.58 lakh hectare in the same period corresponding year.

Total area sown under all rabi crops remained lower at 512.53 lakh hectare so far as against 537.12 lakh hectare in the year-ago, the ministry data showed.