All-time high rice yield in India to take grain output to record 324MT

India is likely to produce nearly 324 million tonnes (MT) of foodgrains in the 2022-23 crop year (July-June), a new record and higher by around 8 MT (2. 5%) than the output in the previous crop year. The increase is mainly backed by the all-time record production of the paddy (131 MT), wheat (112 MT) and pulses (28 MT). High-priority millets could not match the increased attention with bajra recording only marginal increase whereas jowar and ragi reported a decline.

Millets output shows that the farmers continue to prefer paddy (rice) and wheat as current focus of procurement mainly on these two major crops make it an easy choice for them. Overall output of coarse/nutri cereals (53 MT), however, reported an increase in 2022-23 compared to previous year, mainly due to record output of maize and barley. Second advance estimates of production of major crops, released by the agriculture ministry on Tuesday, showed even record output of certain non-foodgrains including oilseeds and sugarcane. Among oilseeds, mustard recorded an increase of over 7% this year compared to 2021-22.

Attributing the record output of foodgrains and oilseeds to ″hard work of farmers, proficiency of scientists and farmer’s friendly poli-cies″ of his government, agriculture minister Narendra Singh Tomar hoped that there would be increase in production and use of coarse/nutri cereals in the coming years. ″It is expected that more and more farmers may switch over to millets during upcoming kharif season, beginning June, as many states have lined up with incentives to them during the International Year of Millets 2023 in sync with the government’s efforts to make India a global hub for millets,″ said an official in the ministry.

The current assessment of production of different crops is based on the feedback received from states and validated with information available from other sources. ″This assessment will undergo further re vision over successive estimates based upon feedback received from the states, alternative sources and other factors,″ said the ministry which comes out with four estimates before releasing the final one for a particular crop year.