Pulses top sowing list

MONSOON WATCH

Though the distribution of monsoon rainfall has been uneven thus far, but crop sowing has been progressing at a relatively much faster pace.

Pulses seem to be the favourites of farmers this year with the area already planted with these crops being 1.5 million hectares, more than the year-ago acreage.

This is partly in response to the current high prices of pulses and partly to persistent below normal rainfall since the second week of June.

The sowing of most other kharif crops has been much larger thus far this year than in last season. The only exception are the coarse cereals, notably bajra, the sowing of which is lagging behind the past year's level.

This is also attributed partly to low rainfall but largely to diversion of area to pulses. The sowing of commercial crops, like cotton, sugarcane and oilseeds, has been fairly extensive, surpassing the acreage planted till now last year.

The monsoon having set in early on May 26 this year, remained fairly vigorous till June 7 but lost part of momentum subsequently.

As the accompanying chart shows, the country as a whole had 68 per cent surplus rainfall till June 7. But it turned negative later on, falling to 3 per cent below normal by June 14.

The deficiency in rainfall accentuated to minus 24 per cent by June 21 and minus 21 per cent by June 28 before the situation began improving a bit. The rainfall deficiency was assessed at minus 9 per cent by July 5 and minus 10 per cent by July 12.

This is, indeed, because of the weak phases that the monsoon passed through, the longest of them being 17 days in the middle of June till June 23.

In July, too, the monsoon did not progress further from July 1 to 8 and entered Delhi only on July 9, instead of scheduled June 30. It stopped advancing again from July 11.

Mercifully, it has again begun moving forward in the north-west region, covering whole of east Rajasthan and some more part of west Rajasthan.

Today, the northern limit of the monsoon passed through Jhalawar, Jodhpur and Ganganagar in Rajasthan. The National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF) says the conditions are now favorable for further advance of the monsoon to the remaining parts of Rajasthan in next 2 to 3 days.

Weather man has predicted good rainfall in the next few days in most parts of the country, barring southern peninsula where it will remain subdued.

However, the ongoing rainfall in Kerala, Karnataka, Konkan and Goa may continue for 3 to 4 days. Isolated rainfall is forecast for Telengana, Rayalseema and Tamil Nadu in 3 days.

But the NCMRWF has warned of heavy to very heavy showers in the Gangetic West Bengal, Jharkhand, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, East Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Uttaranchal in the next few days.

Significantly, the skewed distribution of monsoon rainfall is reflected also in the uneven water levels in reservoirs in different river basins though the total water stored in 76 major dams is 24 per cent above last year's corresponding position and 56 per cent above the past ten years' average as on July 14.

The lowest water storage is in the reservoirs in the Narmada basin (55 per cent below 10-year average), followed by the Ganga basin (47 per cent below average). The highest is in the Sabarmati basin (whopping 780 per cent above average). The overall situation is, however, satisfactory.

The information from states on crop sowing till July 17 indicates that main kharif crop of paddy has already been planted on 10.2 million hectares, against 8.9 million hectares covered till this date last year. This marks an increase of 12.7 per cent.

Cotton sowing, which is almost half-way through, has been done on 3.9 million hectares, against 3 million hectares last year. The transgenic insect-protected Bt cotton is estimated to have been planted on about 3.22 lakh hectares in the north-western cotton belt alone.

Similarly, the area under sugarcane is estimated at 4.45 million hectares this year, against 4.28 million hectares last year.

Kharif oilseeds have been planted on over 9 million hectares, against 8.7 million hectares last year.

Nearly 60 per cent sowing of oilseeds is believed to be over. Pulses have been sown on 4.78 million hectares, against only 3.2 million hectares till this time last season.