Wheat sowing in India has picked up sharply, the farm ministry said on Monday, with farmers planting a million hectares more in the first month of the new season than in the same period last year.
"The total coverage so far is 2.63 million hectares against 1.57 million hectares during the corresponding period of 2005-06," the ministry said in a statement issued after a weekly meeting of officials to assess the area under various crops. Traders said wheat sowing still had a long way to go and it was too early to predict the size of next year's wheat crop, which will be harvested from March. Wheat was sown over nearly 26.65 million hectares in 2005-06.
Sowing is in progress in 12 states, including Madhya Pradesh and the main northern wheat growing regions of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. It will end in December.
India's wheat output this year slumped to 69.4 million tonnes mainly due to ill-timed droughts and floods after early estimates had suggested a much bigger crop. The government has increased the price it will pay farmers for next year's wheat to help boost output. Forced by the lower yield to import wheat after a gap of six years, India has contracted to buy 5.5 million tonnes of the grain, making it one of the largest importers this year.