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Latha Venkatraman

In Maharashtra, 71 talukas in 11 districts have been declared as `drought-affected'.

Mumbai , Nov. 21

IN Maharashtra's Sangli district, where the main crops are sugarcane and grapes, the entire grape crop has been damaged.

As sugarcane is on the belt of Krishna river, it has not been impacted but 35,000 acres of grape has ended the season with no output.

While the rest of the country is euphoric over abundant monsoon rains, parts of Maharashtra are reeling under drought-like conditions. According to information from the Maharashtra Government's Agriculture Department, 71 talukas in 11 districts - Sangli, Satara, Solapur, Latur, Usmanabad, Jalna, Nashik, Ahmednagar, Pune, Aurangabad and Beed - have been declared as `drought-affected'.

Elsewhere, the orange crop has also failed. To some extent the pomegranate, fig, berry and mosambi crop has also been affected. Maharashtra has a total of one-lakh acres of land under grape cultivation in Sangli, Solapur, Pune and Nashik regions and the crop this year will total 5.5 lakh tonnes.

Field crops that have been affected by the absence of rains are coarse cereals including jowar and bajra; and among pulses - moong and urad. Sugarcane has been impacted to an extent in areas where irrigation cover is absent.

Maharashtra, the country's largest sugar producing State, is expected to turn in a much smaller sugarcane crop of 375 lakh tonnes against last season's 535 lakh tonnes. However, for the State's sugar industry this decline in cane production is expected to help it correct its position of excess. It, in turn, is likely to result in sugar production of under 50 lakh tonnes, lower by 20 per cent over the last season's output of 62.2 lakh tonnes.

Inadequate rainfall leading to moisture stress has adversely impacted various crops in these districts, officials of the Agriculture Department said.

"Last three years, Sangli has received inadequate rains. It is very strange, while the rest of the country got good rains some pockets here remained dry. Last year there was some rains, this year no rain at all,'' said Mr Vasant Bhosale, News Editor, Daily Pudhari, a newspaper for farmers.

With the failure of the grape crop in Sangli, at least 30,000 farmers in the district are impacted directly. They own about one to two acres of land. "Farmers with large holdings are able to afford some kind of irrigation. These farmers are totally dependent on rains,'' Mr Bhosale said.

Until October 15, when monsoon starts to recede, Sangli had received only up to 48 per cent of its normal quota of rains, Solapur (50 per cent), Usmanabad (58.5 per cent), Ahmednagar (59 per cent), Pune (66 per cent), Satara (63.9 per cent). Only seven districts have received rains in excess of 100 per cent.

The Government is currently in the process of assessing the extent of damage caused to the crop.

The sugarcane output is also impacted because of poor rains in the previous season as it is a long gestation crop ranging from 12 months to 18 months. The sugarcane crop also came under a pest attack, which has claimed a portion of the crop. According to a government official, yield is likely to be down by 46 per cent.

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