Wheat production down 12%, veggies burnt in field
KANPUR The production of wheat in Kanpur and Bundelkhand has gone down 12% this year, as the region endures the hottest March and April in recent memory.
Wheat is currently being harvested in the fields across the region.
And it is not just wheat. The vegetable production has been affected considerably by the extra-long spell of heatwave in March and April, in which the temperature should ideally be between 20 and 24 degrees Celsius.
A study by a scientist of the Chandra Shekhar Azad (CSA) University for Agriculture and Technology said the situation could worsen in the days to come. According to the study, the weatherman has forecast that temperatures could further rise between April 28 and April 30 to 45 to 46 degrees Celsius, said Dr SN Sanjay Pandey, a scientist of the CSA university.
The reason behind the high temperature has been zero presummer rain in this region this year. Dr Pandey said that in the absence of rain temperatures kept rising in March and went above 40 degrees in April. In 2017, the region had experienced 1.7mm of rain in April; in 2018, 10.4 mm; in 2019, 2.8 mm, in 2020, 31.8 mm, and in 2021, 50.1mm of rain in April. This year, as April draws to a close, the region is yet to get any rainfall.
This is the time for heading or flowering, followed by grain filling the pods, he said. “It has resulted in the expected loss of 12% of the wheat crop across the region,” he said.
Meanwhile, scientists were in for shock at the four research centres of CSA university in Nanamau, Kohlia, Kushha and Dhakapurwa villages of Bilhaur tehsil where teams of scientists monitor crops and vegetables in 500 bighas of land.
Dr Pandey said the production of vegetables has decreased for the first time despite proper watering. “Forty per cent of vegetables were burnt in the sun or spoiled at our research centres. This has surprised all of us,” he said.
“The vegetables that grow under the soil were less affected but those above were badly affected,” he said. The vegetables above the soil were watered adequately at 5 am, but all the moisture dissipated in less than two hours, he said.