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Journalism of Courage
Deficient rainfall in many parts of the country has started showing stress on the progress of sowing of kharif crops. As of the first week of July,the sowing of paddy,the major food grain crop of the season,was down by about 25 per cent compared to last year,according to latest figures released by the Ministry of Agriculture. Sowing of oilseeds was down by almost 50 per cent.
The Met has predicted good rains in most parts of the country in the coming week and that seems to be the last glimmer of hope for farmers to salvage their crops. Until July 2,the country received 43 per cent less rainfall than normal. The kharif sowing window has already crossed its half-way mark and any delay beyond July 15 has the potential to severely upset production estimates.
In fact,in the first acknowledgement of this,Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee,while presenting the annual budget,cited the delay in monsoon as reason for extending the farm loan-waiver scheme by six months.
Replying to a question in the Lok Sabha today,Minister of State for Agriculture K V Thomas said that the government intended to increase allocations under National Food Security Mission and Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana to help states meet the contingent situation arising out of deficient rainfall.
Earlier,the Centre sent an advisory to state governments asking them to make a proactive assessment of demand for wage employment under NREGA as agricultural employment looked set to take a hit. Considering that this is a lean season for employment under NREGA,such an advisory is,effectively,an alert under the Crisis Management Plan for Droughts.
According to data for paddy released yesterday,only about 38.14 lakh hectares (ha) had been sown as compared to 51.80 lakh hectares last year. The decline is most visible in major rice-growing regions of Haryana (-1.15 lakh ha),Orissa (-2.44 lakh ha),Punjab (-7.02 lakh ha) and Uttar Pradesh (-2.05 lakh ha).
As against sowing of about 68.76 lakh hectares of oilseeds by this time last year,total oilseeds sowing so far has been completed in only about 35.58 lakh hectares. The hardest hit have been soybean (a decline of 29.39 lakh hectares) and groundnut (decline of 12.20 lakh hectares). Most affected are Madhya Pradesh (soybean) and groundnut in Gujarat.
