India likely to harvest bumper wheat, mustard & chana crops

Foodgrain production is expected to rise 2% in 2020-21 season to record 303.34 mt, says govt

India’s wheat production in the coming rabi harvest is expected to be a record 109.24 million tonnes, up 1.27 per cent from last year. It is also much higher than the average production of the last five years of 100.42 million tonnes, the second advance estimate of foodgrains production for July 2020-June 2021 crop year showed.

Production of chana (gram), meanwhile, according to the second estimate, is expected to be 11.62 million tonnes, up from 11.08 million tonnes last year. It is much higher than the last five-year average production of 9.77 million tonnes.

Mustard output, which is another key rabi crop is expected to be 10.43 million tonnes during the coming season. This is almost 1.30 million tonnes more than the previous year and much higher than the average production of the last five years (estimated to be 8.30 million tonnes).

The bumper wheat harvest in the rabi season, coupled with strong production of other crops in the kharif season, is expected to push up India’s overall foodgrains production in the 2020-21 season to a record 303.34 million tonnes, up from 297.50 million tonnes last year. The average foodgrains production in the last five years (from 2015-16 crop year to 2019-20 crop year) was 278.88 million tonnes.

Good monsoon, along with favourable weather, is set to aid the rise in production of major crops.

However, the output increase could cause a serious stress on domestic market prices of some crops like chana and mustard in the coming months. This will happen unless there is a strong government intervention through procurement at minimum support price (MSP) to stablise them.

In case of chana, sources said the industry feels that unless the Centre buys over 1.5-1.7 million tonnes of chana (gram), prices will struggle to breach the MSP mark of ~5,100 per quintal.

In the full 2020-21 crop year, total production of pulses is expected to be 24.42 million tonnes, which is more than last year’s production of 23.03 million tonnes. It is also higher than the average production of the last five years, estimated at 21.99 million tonnes.

Similarly, in case of all oilseeds, total production in the full 2020-21 season is estimated to be 37.31 million tonnes. This is up from last year’s production of 33.22 million tonnes and higher than last five-year average production of 30.55 million tonnes.

Sugarcane production in 2020-21 is expected to be 397.66 million tonnes, around 27.16 million tonnes more than 2019-20.

Cotton production is estimated at 36.54 million bales, around 0.48 million bales more than last year (one bale equals to 170 kg).

Meanwhile, in 2020, the Southwest monsoon was 9 per cent above average. This made it the second consecutive year of rainfall being more than normal, a feat which has happened for the first time in almost 60 years. The last time India saw two consecutive years of more than average rainfall nationally was in 1958 and 1959.

In 2020, the Southwest monsoon was more than normal in almost all parts of the country except Northwest India, which comprises major grain-producing areas such as UP, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh and the National Capital Region.

Out of 685 districts in the country, monsoon was normal in almost 75 per cent of them, while it was deficient and below normal in the rest.