Production area of Kharif crops reaches close to 980 lakh hectares
13-Aug-2024 12:23 PM
New Delhi. Due to good rains from the southwest monsoon, the pace of sowing of Kharif crops remains fast. The latest data of the Union Agriculture Ministry shows that during the current year,
the total production area of Kharif crops at the national level has increased to 979.89 lakh hectares till August 12, which is 13.49 lakh hectares more than the sowing area of 966.40 lakh hectares during the same period last year.
Vigorous sowing of crops is still going on in many areas. In comparison to last year, during the current Kharif season, paddy production area jumped from 318.16 lakh hectare to 331.78 lakh hectare,
sowing area of pulses crops increased by 110.08 lakh hectare to 117.43 lakh hectare, area under coarse cereals improved from 171.36 lakh hectare to 173.13 lakh hectare and area under oilseeds improved from 182.17 lakh hectare to 183.69 lakh hectare.
In the category of cash crops and industrial crops, sugarcane production area improved from 57.11 lakh hectare last year to 57.68 lakh hectare this time, but cotton sowing area declined from 12.24 lakh hectare to 110.49 lakh hectare during the same period.
Heavy monsoon rains occurred in the first 10 days of August in most of the major paddy producing states of the country, which helped farmers to speed up its transplantation.
In pulses crops, as expected, production area of Arhar (Tuvar) jumped to 44.57 lakh hectare which is 6.08 lakh hectare more than last year's area of 38.49 lakh hectare. Similarly,
the sowing area of Moong increased from 29.89 lakh hectare to 3278 lakh hectare, but the area of Urad fell from 28.83 lakh hectare to 27.76 lakh hectare and the area of Moth slipped from 9.28 lakh hectare to 8.69 lakh hectare.
Similarly, among oilseed crops, during the period under review, production area of soybean increased from 122.89 lakh hectare to 124.69 lakh hectare and sowing area of groundnut jumped
from 41.61 lakh hectare to 45.42 lakh hectare but area of sesame fell from 11.14 lakh hectare to 10.14 lakh hectare and area of castor declined from 5.34 lakh hectare to 2.44 lakh hectare.
Among coarse cereals, production area of millet decreased from 68.81 lakh hectare to 65.69 lakh hectare and area of ragi fell from 5.91 lakh hectare to 3.61 lakh hectare but sowing area of sorghum
improved from 13.29 lakh hectare to 14.23 lakh hectare and production area of maize jumped from 79.17 lakh hectare to 85.17 lakh hectare.