Rs 16 cr worth crops perish due to rains

Cotton, pigeon pea and other vegetables were hit hard

Excessive rains in the past four days have caused extensive damage to crops on over two lakh hectares of land.

The rainfall has caused a major loss to cotton, pigeon pea and other vegetables. Surat has a major share in the imports and exports of vegetables in Gujarat.

"The expected loss is about Rs16 crore in South Gujarat region," said District Agricultural Officer, KV Patel. All the trenches for the cultivation of vegetables have been destroyed due to the heavy rainfall and soil erosion has added to the loss.

In addition, waterlogging has destroyed standing crops. "Due to waterlogging, the survey cannot be done now and so the correct data will be available after few days," said Patel. Sugarcane cultivation too has seen a tremendous loss, which has affected sugar production in Surat.

"As the sugarcane is grown in October-November season, this was the last season of its production. This time farmers will not be able to take the benefit of the sugarcane grown in the last season. At least 1,20,000 hectres of land under sugarcane cultivation have been hit by the torrential rain in the last four days," added Patel.

"Most of the sugar is stored in the bottom of the sugarcane stem, which gets destroyed due to waterlogging leading to 5to10 per cent loss in the yeild,'' stated Patel. Most hit talukas of Surat are Olpad, Mangrol, Bardoli, Mandvi and Charyasi.

"For the culture of prawns and lobsters, the farmers have made big walls leading to water logging in the Olpad area,'' said Patel.

As per the primary data available with state agriculture department, the rains have affected sesame seed crop in Saurashtra. While there has been five per cent loss in Surendranagar, Relia in Amreli district suffered five per cent loss of sesame seed crop.

In Bhavnagar too, there has been a five per cent loss of the estimated production in the area for sesame seed, according to agriculture department estimates.

In Modasa, maize crop has suffered five per cent loss, while for cotton it was one per cent. The groundnut produce in the area is also expected to be affected by two per cent.