The Hindu : Karnataka News : Record food production despite dry spell

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Mar 26, 2005

Karnataka

Karnataka

Record food production despite dry spell

By T.V. Sivanandan

GULBARGA, MARCH 25. Despite adverse weather and failure of monsoon in crucial months, particularly in the rabi season, the State has, after several years, surpassed the target fixed for the food production during 2004-05.

According to figures furnished by the Agriculture Department for 2004-05, the State is likely to surpass the target of 108.17 million tonnes and reach 108.30 million tonnes.

Official sources told The Hindu here on Thursday that the production of oilseeds and cotton has seen a record upswing in 2004-05. While oilseeds production of 17.97 million tonnes in 2004-05 fell short of the target of 18.22 million tonnes, the production was much more than the achievement in two years.

In 2002-03 and 2003-04, the oilseeds production stood at 11.2 and 10.65 million tonnes respectively as against the target of 17.90 and 18.05 million tonnes respectively.

The fall in oilseeds production in the State in the past few years has been worrying the agriculture experts. But this year's production has reversed this trend.

Sources said the food production was significant in the backdrop of scanty rainfall and intermittent dry spells. There was uneven distribution of rainfall in the first week of July last year affecting crops in record 14.01 lakh hectares out of the 72.24 lakh hectares area under cultivation in kharif season.

Similarly, rabi crops suffered because of a long dry spell from the last week of October to the end of December, affecting crops in 6.95 lakh hectares.

The sources said the State can achieve record production of food despite the adverse conditions mainly because of improved agriculture practices followed by farmers and increase of yield in individual fields.

Another reason for the record production was the marked increase in the coverage in kharif season. As against the targeted coverage during kharif season of 69 lakh hectares, sowing took place in 72.24 lakh hectares. Last year's coverage was 58.31 lakh hectares.

In the rabi season, as against the targeted coverage of 33.51 lakh hectares, the coverage was only 32.98 hectares because of failure of rains in the crucial months of sowing.

This was in comparison to the coverage of 35.38 lakh hectares during 2003-04. The sowing surpassed the targeted figures of 5.65 lakh hectares for summer crops to 5.99 lakh hectares during 2004-05.

Sources said the production of cereals touched 99.84 million tonnes, followed by 8.44 million tonnes of pulses and 18.39 million tonnes of oilseeds. The production of cotton increased from 3.13 lakh bales of 170 kg. each in lint form to 9.27 lakh bales in 2004-05.

Although sugarcane production exceeded the production levels of last year from 158.93 million tonnes to 270 million tonnes, it fell short of the production of 324.79 million tonnes during 2003-04 and the target of 359.70 million tonnes fixed for the 2004-05.

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