GULBARGA: Despite a marginal decrease in the amount of rainfall in the country compared with last year, there has been a marked increase area of cultivation under kharif crops this year.

According to the data available on the coverage of different kharif crops in the country at the end of August this year, farmers have taken up sowing in 932.9 lakh hectares, which is 8.4 lakh hectares more than the corresponding period last year. This is despite the country recording three per cent less than the normal rainfall during kharif season.

Official sources told The Hindu here that the actual all India rainfall during this monsoon was 646.7 mm as against the 668 mm last year. The highest decline in rainfall was recorded in the northeast, where there was a reduction of 17 per cent from the normal rainfall; followed by a 13 per cent decrease in the northwest. However, there was an increase of nine per cent of rainfall in central parts and three per cent increase in the peninsular India.

Sources said the area under the paddy witnessed a highest increase of 8.84 lakh hectares when compared with last year. Paddy has been sown in 306.86 lakh hectares, followed by sugarcane with an increase of 3.55 lakh hectares and castor 2.55 lakh hectares this year.

The crops which witnessed a decline include niger, which showed a decline of 50.18 per cent over the corresponding period last year, and groundnut by 3.9 per cent.

Among the paddy growing States, Bihar witnessed the highest increase in the coverage with 16.3 per cent increase over the last year, followed by Andhra Pradesh (11 per cent). In Karnataka, there is a sharp decline in the coverage under paddy, which fell by 17.7 per cent, followed by Gujarat (7 per cent) and Chhattisgarh (2.5 per cent).

Sources said that another disturbing factor in the agriculture scenario during the kharif season is the decline of about 2.58 per cent in the area covered under the oilseeds. Except for castor, all other oilseeds crops showed a decline.

The area under sugarcane has shown an increase of about 9.5 per cent compared with previous year. The has been an appreciable increase of the area covered in all the sugarcane growing States, except Karnataka.

In Karnataka during the period there has been a decline of about 14 per cent compared with the corresponding period last year.

The highest rise in the sugarcane area was recorded in Maharashtra with an increase of about 62 per cent, followed by 53 per cent in Gujarat. Incidentally, last year there was a severe shortage of sugarcane in Maharashtra, forcing the sugarcane factories in Maharashtra to purchase sugarcane from Karnataka and Gujarat.

There was also an increase of 1.19 per cent in the area under cotton this year compared with previous year. There has been a marginal decrease in the area coming under other cereals such as jowar, bajra, and maize. Among the oilseeds, the decline the area under soya bean, sunflower, sesamum is 2.89 per cent, 2.25 per cent and 3.73 per cent respectively.

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