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The total food crops output during the current kharif season will exceed last season’s record production, the government said here on Tuesday.
The cumulative output of foodgrains and oilseeds during kharif 2017 is projected to be 162.40 million tonnes (mt), against 160.92 mt in the previous season, the government told a national conference on agriculture where State officials were present.
“The production during the current kharif season is expected to be match last year’s record output,” Union Agriculture Secretary Shobhana K Pattanayak told mediapersons on the sidelines of the meeting which set off rabi campaign for the year. While the target for 2017 kharif rice is to be 94.50 mt, marginally less than the 96.39 mt estimated by the fourth advance estimates, the government expected a 13 per cent increase in oilseeds production, even though there was a substantial reduction in the area under oilseeds cultivation.
“We expect the area to increase further as farmers would go for crops like castor once the floodwaters recede in Gujarat and Rajasthan,” a ministry official said.
Higher targets were also set for coarse cereals. As against 32.71 mt in kharif 2016, the target for this current season is 33.75 mt. However, the government said it expected a drop in pulses output to 8.75 mt as compared to 9.42 mt in the previous season.
Addressing the conference, B Rajender, an agriculture ministry official, said adequate quantities of seeds and fertilisers are available across the country for the upcoming rabi season.
While the seed requirement for wheat for the season is 121.26 lakh quintal, the available stock is about 20 per cent higher, at 149.77 lakh quintal.
A higher seed stock is similarly available for chickpea, the other important rabi crop. As against the requirement of 17.16 lakh quintal, the current seed stock is 19.26 lakh quintal.
Similarly, the government estimated that the season will require 162.35 lakh tonnes of urea, 50.83 lakh tonnes of DAP, 16.70 lakh tonnes of MOP and 50.46 lakh tonnes of NPK complex.
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