Experts feel that the food grain production in the current rabi season may set a new record, exceeding the all-time high output of 109.82 million tonnes in 2008. The production of wheat, pulses and oilseeds, notably rapeseed-mustard, is likely to create new records.
With heavy procurement of wheat expected from the fresh crop to be harvested in April, the official wheat inventory might again swell to unsustainable level. “The output of wheat, the main rabi food crop, may equal or exceed the last year’s record 78.57 million tonnes,” said Mangala Rai, director-general of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).
The preliminary estimates put out by the agriculture ministry on February 12 had, however, projected the likely wheat harvest at 77.78 million tonnes, down about 1 per cent from last year. But Rai said these estimates were likely to be revised upwards.
Much would, however, depend on the temperature in the next few weeks. The temperature in the first three weeks of December remained 2 degrees to 5 degrees above normal in the central and peninsular India, which was not good for the crops.
But in the northern rabi belt, it remained more or less normal. “The slight drop in minimum temperature in the early part of last week in key wheat producing states of Punjab and Haryana benefited the standing crop,” he told Business Standard.
Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar had indicated in Parliament last week that the country was once again heading towards a wheat glut.
On the eve of the harvesting of fresh wheat crop, the official food reserves would have around 13 million tonnes of wheat, against the buffer stock norm of 4 million tonnes.
The wheat procurement in the ensuing rabi marketing season in April and May might be between 20 and 22 million tonnes, pushing up the total wheat inventory to beyond 33 million tonnes. The government needs only about 12 million tonnes of wheat in a year to meet the requirement of the public distribution system and welfare programmes.
The ICAR chief also anticipated a good harvest of rapeseed-mustard, the major rabi oilseed. The agriculture ministry has already projected the output to rise by nearly 20 per cent over last year’s 5.83 million tonnes to touch 6.98 million tonnes.
The actual production of this oilseed may turn out to be even higher than this thanks to about 10 per cent higher sowing due to copious rainfall towards the end of the monsoon season in September in the key mustard-growing belt of Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Haryana. The early sown mustard crop is already being harvested in parts of Rajasthan.
The oilseed crops in the southern states are also said to be in good shape because of higher sowing facilitated by the early onset of the North-West Monsoon and congenial weather so far.
The rabi pulses, chiefly gram, are expected to grow by over 13 per cent this year due to expansion in area and absence of any major disease or pest epidemic. The ministry’s projections put the likely output of rabi pulses at around 9.43 million tonnes, up 12.8 per cent from last season’s 8.36 million tonnes. Gram production alone is put at 6.54 million tonnes, about 13.74 per cent higher than last year’s 5.75 million tonnes.
Rai said the country would have experienced a glut of potato this year but for the outbreak of bacterial blight disease on this crop in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
The agriculture experts are, however, concerned over the lack of winter rains so far this season. The total rainfall between January 1 and February 11 in whole country was 38 per cent below normal, according to the data compiled by the India Meteorological department (IMD).
However, this has not dimmed the rabi outlook perceptibly as yet because the rainfall deficiency in the main rabi belt of north-west has been only marginal (11 per cent) and most of the rabi crops are grown in irrigated fields. The deficiency has been much higher in other regions — 80 per cent in central India, 77 per cent in the North-East and 75 per cent in the southern peninsula.
