The department of agriculture has projected a total foodgrain production target of 118.76 million tonnes (mt) for the ensuing rabi season which is marginally lower than 119.19 mt projected for the 2010-11 rabi season.
For primary rabi crops, the department has estimated a production target of 84 mt for wheat (82 mt) and pulses at 10.27 mt (10.79 mn tonne).
Last year, in the beginning of rabi season department had estimated wheat crop to be around 82 mt. However, according to the agriculture ministry’s fourth advance estimate, wheat crop was 85.93 mt for 2010-11. Agriculture minister Sharad Pawar had recently said wheat crop for rabi 2011-12 can be even as high as 86 mt.
Besides, the department has decided to increase area under pulses by one million hectares and increase production of coarse cereals, especially sorghum, besides augmenting other crops like grams and lentil in the ensuing rabi season.
While rice is estimated status quo at 15 mt, the production of total coarse cereals is pegged at 9.49 mt (11.40 mt). Oilseeds production is expected to be around 11.5 mt (12.50 mt).
In the kharif season, while total crop area increased by 2.33 million hectares, the overall pulses area had decreased by 1.14 million hectares according to the estimates released by the ministry. If the area under pulses grows by one million hectares, then total area under pulses is expected to be around 12 million hectares as against 11 million hectares last year.
Kharif and rabi are two crop seasons in India wherein kharif runs from June to October and rabi is from November to March.
For rice, the focus will be hybrid rice cultivation. The department has advised to start sowing of wheat from October 25 onwards, accompanied by seed treatment and fungicides. Besides more than one variety of wheat needs to be grown to compensate for terminal heat-related losses.
In order to improve the cultivation of pulses, the department has advised to bring 300,000-400,000 lakh hectares area of summer moong and urad under the irrigated areas in Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh. In eastern India, gram and lentil will be promoted in rice fallows, which could be around 500,000 hectares and about 100,000 hectares of sugarcane will be intercropped with pulses in Uttar Pradesh.
While for crops like chana (gram), lentil and mustard the ministry does not expect the acreage to go up significantly, it is still focusing on maintaining good productivity. For lentil, intercropping with oilseed crop has been advised. In coarse cereals, the ministry proposes to maintain ideal acreage of 130,000-150,000 hectares with high yield hybrids. The focus areas for rabi sorghum are Maharastra and Karnataka.
Analysing the kharif loss in pulses, officials said production loss of 400,000-600,000 tonnes is due to less area coverage. Maharastra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh have shifted from pulses to soybean and cotton due to less rainfall.
