In dry Marathwada, farmers favour water-guzzling cane
Marathwada is reeling under severe drought this year, but the area under sugarcane cultivation — a crop known to guzzle water — rose to 3.41 lakh hectares.
That’s a 1.27 lakh-hectare rise from 2017-18, and makes up nearly a third of the state’s area under cane cultivation, according to the state sugar commissionerate.
In Beed, one of the eight districts of Marathwada where water stock has dwindled to just 3.6%, area under sugarcane cultivation was 49,690 hectares. It surpassed cotton, considered a mainstay here.
The farmers who planted sugarcane did so before the rains, hoping for a good monsoon.
But now, they are unlikely to get an optimum yield as there is little water to irrigate the crop through its 12-to-18-month cycle. Can arid Marathwada support a crop that needs so much water? And, why do farmers still sow sugarcane in the region?
Consider this. Sugarcane in Maharashtra requires 2,063mm to 2,468mm of rainfall or water on one hectare to complete the crop’s 12-to-18-month cycle.
This is according to a 2018 report, Water Productivity Mapping of Major Indian Crops, for the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development, by the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations.
On an average, it takes 2,068 litres of water to produce 1kg of sugar. However, the average rainfall in Marathwada is only 880 mm. To add to this, Marathwada has faced deficit rainfall for three of the past five years. This year, the deficit is 50%.
When HT surveyed the Aurangabad and Beed districts
MUMBAI: EVEN FARMERS WHO RELIED SOLELY ON GROUND WATER WERE SOWING THE CROP.
THE IRONY IS, EVEN VILLAGES RELYING ON TANKERS FOR DRINKING WATER BY OCTOBER, HAS A STANDING SUGARCANE CROP
in October for a ground report on drought, we found cane cultivation was not limited only to farmers who had access to canals for irrigated water.
Even farmers who relied solely on ground water, through farm ponds or wells, were sowing the crop.
The irony is, even villages relying on tankers for drinking water by October, such as Wadali in the Gangapur tehsil, has a standing sugarcane crop. This year, 67 out of 76 tehsils in the region have seen ground water depletion in the range of 1m to 3m. “Marathwada is heading towards desertification, and unsustainable cultivation of a crop like cane is aggravating the situation,” said Pradeep Purandare, a water expert from Aurangabad.
But representatives of the politically-strong sugar industry do not agree. And, farmers are still confident about the returns from the sugarcane crop. “Sugarcane is an efficient crop that provides sugar, fuel and even power,” said Congress legislator from Latur, Amit Deshmukh, who owns two sugar factories.
“The sugar industry in our state is spurring the rural economy, giving support to farmers and providing jobs, unlike any other crop. So, to ban or even restrict cane that is advantageous to farmers is not possible. To say it is responsible for drought is myopic.”
“We realise sugarcane requires four times more water than any other crop, but it also gives us an assured price unlike any other crop,” said Amol Tipale, a farmer in Beed’s Hirapur village and also its sarpanch. “After planting cane, I can reap the dividends of a single yield for another three years, and input costs do not increase year on year, unlike cotton.”
Hirapur is likely to run out of water within a month, with only one shrunken well now supplying water to the entire village. The Sindhphana river close by has already dried up.