Tn Oilseeds Cultivation Stays Static

The area under oilseeds in Tamil Nadu has remained static, fluctuating around 12 lakh hectares, for the last 20 years, according to the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University vice-chancellor, Abdul Kareem. A similar trend of static position had also been seen in production and productivity, he said.

Groundnut production, which was eight lakh tonnes in 1981, had now increased to 20 lakh tonnes. Groundnut was the major oilseed crop of the state, followed by sesamum, sunflower and castor.

Groundnut was cultivated in 1.22 million hectares of land and the average pod yield was 1292 kg/ha. The state accounted for 13.8 per cent and 18.3 per cent of the area and production respectively.

f groundnut in the country. The area under cultivation and production had increased by 46.5 and 52.5 per cent respectively over four decades, whereas productivity had shown only a 4.7 per cent increase, Kareem said.

Under irrigated conditions, there was a gap of nearly 600 kg/ha between the potential yield and that obtained in the farmers' field. There were many constraints in increasing the production, such as lack of varieties for high input management in western zone and lack of early maturing variety

to fit in relay cropping in southern zone, the vice-chancellor said.

Lack of research for designing different kinds of labour saving implements for harvesting, striping and decortication, added to the woes of groundnut growers, he said.