Late North Indian rains seen conducive for wheat

Recent rains in three northern Indian states, regarded as the country's grain bowl, will help the timely sowing of the winter wheat crop, officials and experts said on Thursday, easing concerns about the impact of a poor monsoon. Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana, India's top three producers of wheat, accounted for 69 percent of national production of 80.6 million tonnes of wheat in the 2008/2009 crop year.
"Rains during the past few days will help in timely and proper germination of wheat in rain-fed areas," said D.P. Singh, a farm scientist with Gobind Ballabh Pant University of Agriculture and Technology. The rains are expected to add to soil moisture in the states, especially in rice fallows where paddy sowing did not take place this summer due to the bad monsoon. Annual monsoon rains were 23 percent below average this year, the weakest since 1972.
India is the world's second-largest wheat producer and the poor monsoon had raised concerns the crop would be affected. Sowing of other winter crops including rapeseed would benefit from late monsoon showers, Singh said. The Uttar Pradesh Agriculture Department has estimated wheat area at 9.25 million hectares for the crop year to June 2010, down 2.7 percent from 9.51 million hectares in 2008/09. Uttar Pradesh, India's biggest wheat producer, expects to produce 30 million tonnes in 2009/10, up 5.3 percent from 28.5 million tonnes in 2008/09.
For Punjab, initial estimates for output and area are 14.8 million tonnes and 3.45 million hectares respectively. "The current conditions are conducive for timely sowing of wheat in Punjab. If there's no major change in weather we can expect smooth sowing operations in the state," Navreet Singh Kang, Punjab's Financial Commissioner of Development, told Reuters.
Last crop year, Punjab produced 15.7 million tonnes of the grain from 3.49 million hectares. "The production can go higher than the current estimates, but it is tough to give any figure right now," said an official of the Punjab farm department. Haryana is expected to produce 11.5 million tonnes from 2.5 million hectares in 2009/10 against last crop year's 11.4 million tonnes produced in an equivalent area. "We expect timely sowing of wheat as rains will provide the needed moisture to soil," said B.S. Duggal, additional director with the Haryana farm department.