Kharif planting of major crops showed a positive trend with area under rice, pulses and sugarcane cultivation recording marginal increase over the previous season, according to the data released by the Agriculture Ministry on Friday.

As against a total of 72.31 lakh hectares for the corresponding week in 2016-17, the acreage under cultivation has gone up to 81.33 lakh ha till this week.

Rice is planted so far over total area of 5.51 lakh ha as against 4.52 lakh ha in 2016-17 with States such as Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and West Bengal taking the lead.

Acreage under sugarcane cultivation stands at 47.39 lakh ha at end of the week as against 44.82 lakh ha corresponding period the previous year. Higher area of cultivation is reported from the major sugarcane-growing States of UP and Maharahstra.

The increase in area under pulses cultivation in Karnataka (0.56 lakh ha) has helped the total area of pulses cultivation move to 1.64 lakh ha, which is 0.44 lakh ha more than this day last year.

Cotton cultivation is also picking up momentum with total area of cultivation covering 14.06 lakh ha so far, around 4 lakh ha more than last year. But the area is slightly lower than normal for the corresponding week, which is 14.39 lakh ha. An increase is also reported in coarse cereals 4.59 lakh ha (as against 3.89 lakh ha in 2016-17) and oilseeds 1.27 lakh ha (0.94 lakh ha), the Ministry document showed.

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