Gujarat projects good wheat crop during Rabi 2007-08

The Gujarat government has identified foodgrains as the thrust area this Rabi season and has projected a good wheat crop during the Rabi season 2007-08. The sowing will start this month. However, because of the likely increased area under wheat, the area under rapeseed is likely to fall this season in the state.

"According to our projections for the Rabi 2007-08 season the state's wheat crop will be good. The area under wheat is likely to be around 12.50 lakh hectares in Gujarat against the last season's 12.01 lakh hectares.

On an average the state's normal area under wheat is 5.44 lakh hectares. The increase over last year's wheat area is 4.08 per cent. The wheat production will also increase but our efforts will be to increase productivity.

"The prospect for wheat crop this Rabi is 35.6 lakh MT against last year's when it was 30 lakh MT. If this is achieved then the state's wheat production will rise 18.73 per cent," said a senior official of Agriculture and Co-operation Department, Gujarat.

The wheat target is expected to be easy to achieve this year as the farmers are likely to shift towards wheat on their own as the commodity is likely to fetch good prices this year following the reports of poor crop in Ukraine and Russia and the increasing domestic demand.

"However, as a government effort we are trying to increase the production of wheat through various measures. Our focus will be on districts like Ahmedabad, Patan and Banas Kantha that have low productivity and also set additional target for the traditional wheat-growing districts including Mehsana, Sabarkantha, Patan, Kheda, Anand , Bhavnagar and Junagadh," he said.

The government's efforts will be to provide quality seeds on time to ensure timely sowing.

"We will put the emphasis on varieties like HYV-GW-1, GW-2 for the duram wheat. We will also promote the use of gypsum and micronutrient through our awareness programmes."

However, the increased wheat area is likely to have an adverse impact on the state's Rabi oilseed crop of rapeseedômustard. "The area under rapeseed is likely to be encroached by wheat as the farmers expect good returns from wheat this year. The rapeseed area will be 3.55 lakh hectares down 1.66 per cent from last year's 3.60 lakh hectares. The area can also further shift to wheat as the sowing season progresses. On an average the area under rapeseed remains 2.34 lakh hectares," he said.

"Our efforts are to match the rapeseed production with last years' output of 5.04 lakh MT. However, the output may decrease 5 per cent to 7 per cent," he added.

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation's (FAO) outlook on the global wheat production will be 602.1 million MT during 2007-08 against last year's 595.4 million MT which is a small increase of 1.1 per cent.

However, due to the increased consumption the global-ending stocks are likely to be 142.6 million MT down 10.4 per cent from last year's 159.2 million MT.

The December future contract prices of wheat, on the Chicago Board of Trade, had increased to hit a record $350 per tonne on September 28.

The wheat future prices lost the September price gains during late October and wheat contract for March 2008 slipped to $299 per tonne. However, this is still 60 per cent higher than last year's wheat future prices.

According to FAO's latest Food Outlook the global rapeseed production in 2007-08 which will be 48.6 million MT, marginally up from the last year's 47 million MT.