Maharashtra to up pulses acreage by 2 lakh hectares

In response to the Centre's action plan, the Maharashtra government has planned to increase pulses acreage by 2 lakh hectares in 2007-08 (June-May), a government official said.

In the first week of April, the Centre had announced plans to up acreage under pulses in the country by 2 million hectares.

"We are planning to bring 2 lakh hectares more under pulses in the coming kharif and rabi seasons together," Krishna Lavekar, agricultural commissioner, Maharashtra, said.

In the pulses complex, the state would concentrate more on tur (pigeon pea), followed by urad (black matpe), moong, and chana (chick pea), he said. The state has tremendous scope to increase output of tur by increasing productivity and acreage, Lavekar said. "We expect at least 5-10 per cent rise in productivity in tur in the main cultivation areas of Vidarbha and Marathwada," he said. Currently, among kharif crops, the state has 1.08 million hectares under tur, besides 6 lakh hectares under moong, and 4.9 lakh hectares under urad. In the rabi season, the main crop chana, occupies 1.28 million hectares.

Typically, agricultural activity in the country is broadly classified into three categories of crops, namely kharif (June-September), rabi (October-January), and summer(February-May). Current productivity for tur in Maharashtra is 717 kg a hectare, while, for urad and chana, it is 382 kg and 819 kg, Lavekar said.

In 2006-07, the state produced 2.4 million tonnes of pulses, compared with 2.2 million tonnes a year ago."The area under pulses may not rise much but taking recourse to intercropping will be resorted to wherever possible, to up the productivity of pulses in general and tur in particular," he said. Farmers have been asked to produce tur by intercropping in jowar (sorghum), soybean, and cotton fields.

Experiments of bringing chana under irrigation have yielded a productivity level of around 1 tonne a hectare on the average, and even as high as 1.5 tonnes a hectare in some cases, he said. This is likely to add to the chana output next year.

More acreage under pulses is expected to eat into area currently under some other crop in the state.

According to Lavekar, the shift in acreage is likely to impact sugarcane and wheat. Due to record sugarcane crop in 2006-07 (October-September), the state is experiencing surplus cane, jeopardizing farmers.

In the coming years, these farmers are expected shift into chana, which is commanding high prices at present, Lavekar said.

Wheat farmers are also expected to shift to chana due to lack of cold weather in the state. Wheat normally needs severe cold weather with longer duration, like the one that prevails in Punjab and Haryana. Also, wheat productivity in Maharashtra is less than half, compared with Punjab and Haryana.

"If the same resources are used for producing chana, farmers will fetch more money," Lavekar suggests.