Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar hopes that monsoon rains, crucial to Kharif sowing, will progress in the coming days and said it is too early to comment on the paddy acreage.
As of July 15, the paddy sowing was down by 17.4 per cent to 128.50 lakh hectares LH this Kharif season against 155.53 LH in the same period of the previous year, according to data from the Ministry of Agriculture. The sowing areas of pulses, coarse cereals and oilseeds are higher by 7 -- 9 per cent.
The weather office has predicted a normal monsoon this year.
Asked about Kharif's operations and lesser area under paddy, Tomar said it is too early to say anything. He said that it's too early to say if a 17 per cent fall in paddy acreage will happen or not. The minister was speaking on the sidelines of the 94th foundation day of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research ICAR Former Agriculture Commissioner S K Malhotra said that there was enough time for paddy sowing until August 10 and there is enough time to fill up the gap.
Paddy acreage has improved in the last week compared to the previous week. Sowing was down 24 per cent as of July 8. The rains this month will be crucial in order to compensate for the fall in the paddy acreage.
India received 14 per cent more rainfall than normal for the season, but states such as Jharkhand, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh have witnessed deficient rainfall.
In Uttar Pradesh, rainfall deficiency was 65 per cent more than normal with the state receiving just 77.3 mm of rainfall as opposed to the normal 220 mm between June 1 and July 15. In Jharkhand, the rainfall deficit was 49 per cent, while in Bihar it was 42 per cent.
In the foodgrain category, the area under coverage for pulses increased by 9 per cent to 72.66 LH from 66.69 LH in the year-ago period.
Even though the acreage of corn is down to 49.90 LH from 56.69 LH, the sowing area of coarse cereals is up 8 per cent to 93.91 LH from 87.06 LH. The area under coverage for bajra increased to 34.46 LH from 20.88 LH.
In the non-food grains category, the area under oilseeds grew 7.38 per cent to 134.04 LH from 124.83 LH. The soyabean area is up 10 per cent from 90.32 LH to 99.35 LH under oilseeds. Cotton acreage is up 6.44 per cent, from 96.58 LH, to 102.8 LH. The area of sugarcane is barely down to 53.31 LH from 53.70 LH.
The area under jute and mesta is slightly less than 6.89 LH in the same period last year, compared to 6.92 LH in the same period last year.
The total area under coverage for Kharif is 592.11 LH as of July 15 in the ongoing Kharif season from 591.3 LH in the same period last year.
The sowing of Kharif crops begins in June with the onset of the southwest monsoon. Paddy is a major crop of Kharif.