India's total agriculture crop production is expected to record a decline after six years of continuous growth, a leading think-tank has said in its monthly review.
The agriculture sector as a whole is expected to drop by 4.7 per cent and foodgrain output by 5.6 per cent in 2009-10 following a poor rainfall, the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) has said.
While the Union Budget will aid the growth process in the economy, the failure of the monsoon will hit growth this year. The precipitation during the first two months of the monsoon period was 19 per cent below normal. Barring Karnataka, the entire country suffered delayed or very low rains, CMIE said
The poor rainfall in June and its skewed distribution even after a revival in July will bring down the yield of crops sowing during the kharif season.
Since acreage is not likely to rise significantly, this implies a fall in kharif crop production.
A projected fall of 10 per cent will bring down rice production to 89.6 million tonnes from an all-time high output of 99 million tonnes in 2008-09. Coarse cereals production is expected to drop by 8.8 per cent, it said.
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However, pulses production is expected to rise due to higher production of tur and rabi gram, CMIE said.
In 2009-10, non-foodgrain production is projected to decline by 3.5 per cent. Cotton production is likely to reach 22 million bales. This implies a fall of 5 per cent in addition to the 10.5 per cent decline in 2008-09.
Sugarcane production is likely to fall by 6.7 per cent to 253 million tonnes in 2009-10 after a steep fall of 22 per cent recorded in 2008-09, the CMIE said.
As prospects for agriculture crop production do not appear to be encouraging, the huge procurement of paddy and wheat will provide some buffer against the expected shortfall, the economic think-tank said.
During 2009-10 rabi marketing season, the government procured 25.3 million tonnes of wheat against 22.7 million tonnes in the previous year. Paddy procurement also rose 20 per cent to 32.2 million tonnes during October-July 2009-10.
Concerns over an unsatisfactory monsoon leading to a poor kharif crop prompted the government to resume its ban on wheat exports in July, reversing its earlier decision that it would allow shipments by state firms.
CMIE expects pulses production to increase by 6.8 per cent during 2009-10. By end-July 2009, 73.6 lakh hectares were sown under pulses. This was 10 per cent more than the area sown by end-July 2008.
Acreage under arhar has shot up by 24.5 per cent to 27.3 lakh hectares by July 2009. Consistently good rainfall in Karnataka and a revival in July in Maharashtra is likely to have attracted farmers to grow more of this crop, it said.