As Saurashtra grapples with flood, N. Gujarat awaits rain for sowing

Its a double whammy for farmers in Gujarat. On one hand, the delayed monsoon in key growing regions has brought down sowing area, while the recent torrential rains in Saurashtra and South Gujarat have wrecked havoc on the kharif cash crops — groundnut, pulses and cotton.

While the State government is yet to officially initiate crop damage assessment, farmer leaders have expressed fears of massive damage to groundnut and cotton, which were in the plantation stage.

Massive damage to farms

“The recent rains have caused heavy flooding of fields in several districts of Saurashtra leading to land erosion and water logging at most places. Due to this, farms are submerged in the water and we fear damage to key kharif crops such as groundnut and cotton,” said Vitthal Dudhatra, President, Gujarat Pradesh of Bhartiya Kisan Sangh (BKS).

“In many talukas of Junagadh and Gir-Somnath districts — heartland for groundnut — the crop is feared to fail completely due to water logging. Now farmers need to switch to shorter duration crops only,” said Dudhatra.

Crop switch likely

Farmers estimate worst damage to groundnut in the range of 55-75 per cent of the sowing so far.

With loss in the long-duration kharif crops, farmers are looking at short-duration pulses crops such as green gram (moong), black gram (urad) and pigeon peas (tur) for remaining part of the monsoon sowing.

Cash crops hit

The districts of Gir-Somnath, Junagadh, Amreli and Bhavnagar in Saurashtra, Navsari, Valsad and Dang districts in South Gujarat received heavy rains in the past 10 days.

While Gir-Somnath and Junagadh have high concentration of groundnut and soyabean acreage in the State, Amreli and Bhavnagar are cotton heartland. In South Gujarat, paddy and ragi sowing are affected.

“The rains have washed away paddy and ragi crops in Dang and parts of Valsad. But there is still hope for re-sowing,” said an agriculture officer in South Gujarat.

For Shitaldas Sonaiya in Vithhalpur in Gir-Somnath district, groundnut crop is affected due to flooding of river.

“I had invested over ₹1 lakh before monsoon towards protection wall on the fields which got washed away in the heavy rains,” he said. Sonaiya has 10 bigha (approx 4 acres) under groundnut and soyabean each, but he fears more loss in groundnut.

“At least cattle are saved and farmers can look up to milk production to survive in the agriculture losses,” he said.

North Gujarat dry

While Saurashtra region has seen a robust sowing activity, North Gujarat has progressed at a snail’s pace because of the scanty rainfall in the region.

As against Saurashtra, which has received total rainfall of over 57 per cent, North Gujarat region has got over 18 per cent of the normal rainfall so far.

The region has seen a sharp decline in the sowing of castor, guar and grains such as bajra and jowar, besides a drop in groundnut sowing. As compared to last year, total sowing in the region is lower by 50 per cent as on July 19 against the same period last year.

Meanwhile, in a media interaction, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani stated that assessment of crop loss and property damage will begin soon and 161 teams have been formed to undertake the survey in the affected regions.

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