Four districts in Saurashtra produced 14 lakh mt of groundnuts

The production of groundnut has registered 14 lakh MT across Amreli, Junagadh, Bhavnagar and Porbandar Saurashtra-Kutch region till date. It is followed by cotton 8 lakh MT and other agri commodities amounting 27 lakh MT comprising sugarcane, oilseeds, cereals, grains among others.

The rain was good last year and by and large it benefited the farmers of Saurashtra-Kutch region, because majority of them had either opted to cultivate groundnut or cotton, explained M J Vankar, joint director agriculture.

The high yield has been registered despite the groundnut cultivation area declining by four per cent compared to last year.

It decreased to 18,12,400 hectors from 18,91,000 hectare.

However, the yield registered is almost in parity with that estimated in the oil-millers meeting which Saurashtra Oil Millers Association (SOMA), organised at Gondal on September 25 last year.

Oil-millers had estimated produce of at least 28 lakh MT as against the cultivation of groundnut done in 18 lakh hectare across Saurashtra-Kutch region, further forecasting edible oil rates to slide between Rs 425 to Rs 430 per 15 litres.

Talking to Business Standard, SOMA president Ukab Patel said, "Almost the first phase of peeling edible oil seeds is over and now the arrival of fresh groundnut crops from this four districts shall continue till Diwali."

"However, peeling of groundnut seeds is still continuing in different phases and stages at various oil-mills across the region. Oil prices are likely to remain in parity as we had projected in last year's meeting," he added.

Unseasonal showers experienced recently did not have much effect on groundnut and so we do not see any price hike in edible oil at this stage, assured Patel.

Agriculture department estimates 14,48,880 MT of groundnut yield across this four districts, followed by 8,37,649 MT yield of cotton and 27,62,297 MT of other agri products comprising seaseme, tuver, moong, urad, castor, pulses, millet, sugarcane which was cultivated across 16,18,527 hectare of agriculture land.

Junagadh district registered the highest cultivation of groundnut among the four districts where the the per hectare yield was 1,300 kilograms across 3,96,280 hectare of agriculture land.

Highest cultivation of cotton was registered in Bhavnagar District as cotton cultivation across 2,31,740 hectare of area yielded 1,850 kilograms per hectare.

For kharif crops, Amreli District led by registering cultivation across 5,17,911 hectare, followed by Bhavnagar District registering cultivation of 4,82,262 hectare and Junagadh registered cultivation of 4,74,775 hectare.

But Junagadh district leads in per hectare cultivation with 16,100 kilograms of yield registered per hectare, followed by Amreli District with 9,250 and Bhavnagar with 8,550.