The Central data on rice procurement during the Rabi season for Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2014-15 has missed mentioning out Chhattisgarh also as ‘one of the main rice growing States’ in the country. An official note on Rabi season rice procurement in various states had this to say: Rice procurement for Rabi crop during Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2014-15 of main rice growing states during the season are — Odisha-6.70 lakh tonnes, West Bengal-9.15 lakh tonnes, Telangana-14.74 lakh tonnes, Tamil Nadu-10 lakh tonnes and Andhra Pradesh-10 lakh tonnes.
Sowing for Rabi crops was completed in more than 15.90 lakh hectares till February 11 this year in Chhattisgarh, officials stated. This accounted for 85 percent of the target of 18.76 lakh hectares set by the State Agriculture Department for the Rabi season. It includes food-grains, pulses, oil-seeds and vegetables, they stated.
Agriculture Department officials said that a target of 4.20 lakh hectares has been set for wheat, paddy, Maize and Jau-Jwar and other food grains for the Rabi season. Sowing has been done in 356380 hectares till February 9 against the target, they said. In pulses, sowing has been done for Maize in 348340 hectares, Peas in 47180 hectares, Masoor in 27420 hectares, Moong in 15310 hectares, Urad in 10870 hectares, Tiura in 334660 hectares, Kulthi in 27900 hectares and other pulses in 600880 hectares. The farmers have completed sowing of pulses in 818560 hectares.
Among the oil-seeds, the farmers have sown Alsi, Rai-Sarso, Toriya, Sunflower, Kusum, Groundnut and other oil-seeds in Rabi season. In this Rabi season, the farmers have done sowing of oil seeds in about 232030 hectares so far.
The officials said that sugarcane seeds have been sown in 24430 hectares. Similarly, vegetable seeds have been sown in more than 1.95 lakh hectares. Other crop seeds have been sown in more than 183900 hectares across the State, the officials said. Sowing for Rabi crops was completed in more than 9.5 lakh hectares till December last year for the Kharif Marketing Year 2014-15 in Chhattisgarh, officials stated.
This accounted to 51 percent of the target of 18.76 lakh hectares set by the Agriculture Department for the Rabi season. It includes food-grains, pulses, oil-seeds and vegetables, they stated. Agriculture Department officials stated that a target of 1.70 lakh hectares has been set for wheat and sowing of wheat in 70330 hectares has been done so far.
Similarly target for paddy is 1.74 lakh hectares, for Maize is 70000 hectares, for Jau-Jwar is 5360 hectares. In total the target for food grains is 4.20 lakh hectares and sowing of food grains has been done in 85860 hectares so far.
They further said that Gram has been sown in 2.14 lakh hectares, Peas in 27790 hectares, Masoor in 16950 hectares, Moong in 12240 hectares, Urad in 19250 hectares, Tiura in 3.05 lakh hectares, Kulthi in 22320 hectares and other pulses in 6440 hectares. The farmers have completed sowing on 613775 hectares against the target of more than 9 lakh hectares.
Among the oil-seeds, the farmers have sown Alsi in 41000 hectares, Rai-Sarso and Toriya in 97930 hectares, Til in 2240 hectares, Sunflower in 550 hectares, Kusum in 4250 hectares, Groundnut in 2780 hectares, and other oil-seeds in 3950 hectares. A target of 2.91 lakh has been set for oil-seeds and the farmers have sown more than 1.52 lakh hectares so far. Sugarcane has been sown in 15150 hectares and vegetables in 92780 hectares, the officials said.
In the current Kharif Marketing Season 2014-15, support price for thick paddy variety has been fixed as Rs1360 and for thin variety it is Rs1400 per quintal. The Central Government has fixed procurement target for Rabi Marketing Season (RMS) 2015-16 as 300.59 lakh tonnes against the actual wheat procurement of 280.23 lakh tonnes during RMS 2014-15, an official press release stated. The target was fixed in the meeting of State Food Secretaries held to discuss procurement arrangements. The meeting was chaired by Sudhir Kumar, Union Secretary of Food and Public Distribution in New Delhi recently.
The Central Government has also fixed target for overall rice procurement for Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2014-15, as 351.09 lakh tonnes which include 300.50 lakh tonnes for Kharif crop and 50.59 lakh tonnes for Rabi crop, it stated. The actual procurement of rice during KMS 2013-14 and KMS 2014-15 so far has been reported as 318.39 lakh tonnes and 207.44 lakh tonnes respectively.
Procurement estimates of main wheat growing states as reported by them are Punjab- 120 lakh tonnes, Haryana- 70 lakh tonnes, Madhya Pradesh- 60 lakh tonnes, Uttar Pradesh- 30 lakh tonnes and Rajasthan- 18 lakh tonnes. As per Rabi Crops data released by Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Union Ministry of Agriculture, total area coverage as on today under Rabi crops moves to 615.74 lakh hectares while last year’s sowing area was at 656.89 lakh hectare.
Sowing area for wheat in the country is at 306.35 lakh hectares as compared to last year’s 315.32 lakh hectares. The area under sowing of total Coarse cereals is at 57.74 lakh hectares as compared to last year’s 60.08 lakh hectares. The area under sowing of Gram is at 85.91 lakh hectares this year while the last year’s figure was 102.25 lakh hectares. Area coverage under Total Pulses is at 145.92 lakh hectares while the last year’s sowing area coverage was 162.21 lakh hectares. Similarly sowing area under total oilseeds is at 80.92 lakh hectares as compared to 90.20 lakh hectares last year.