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India is hopeful of registering close to 28 per cent rise in production of red lentils (or masoor dal) at around 1.6 million tonnes in 2020-21 backed by a good sowing and favourable weather conditions.
Red lentils production has been hovering in the range of around 1.25 million tonnes for the past four-to-five years.
According to S K Malhotra, Agriculture Commissioner, the speed and extent of sowing of red lentils so far is much better than last year as the reservoirs are full and moisture content is apt.
“We have a target of sowing on around 14.4 lakh hectare of land and sowing is already complete on around 3.7 lakh hectares so far. The sowing window is available till December 15. As things stand we should have favourable climatic conditions for a good crop this year,” Malhotra said at a webinar organised by the India Pulses and Grains Association on Friday.
The total consumption of red lentils in India is estimated to be close to 1.9-2 million tonnes, and the key consuming states are West Bengal, Bihar and some of the northeastern states of Tripura, Nagaland, Assam and Manipur. The shortfall in production is met by imports, which is to the tune of around 0.7-0.8 million tonnes a year.
According to Sunil Kumar Singh, Additional MD, NAFED, there has been some issues in matching the supply and demand, however, with the increased production this year, the gap should be narrowed, and imports could be lower.
Pulses procurement
Talking about procurement of pulses, he said, there were some infrastructural issues in procurement in some of the states including UP, Jharkhand and West Bengal among others. However, those have been largely addressed, and the government is hopeful of ramping up procurement of lentils at MSP which has been fixed at ₹5,100 a quintal.
“If we can ensure MSP to farmers this year then in the next one-to-two years we should be able to increase our production to around two million tonnes,” Singh said.
The government would come in as major buyers if prices went down below MSP, he assured.
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