The Union government has stepped up monitoring of rainfall and agricultural operations as the El Niño weather pattern raises the risk of disruption to the southwest monsoon. Officials are tracking the evolving situation closely and preparing field-level strategies for states that could face drought conditions.
After a review meeting in New Delhi, Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said sowing in the current kharif season has covered 86.4 million acres so far, which is 22.7 million acres less than the same period last year. He said the delayed onset of the monsoon has affected soybean and cotton cultivation.
Farmers have been advised to shift, where feasible, to short-duration and low-water crops such as maize, pearl millet and green gram. To avoid seed shortages, the government has kept a buffer stock of 175,000 quintals of seeds across the country.
The minister said the rainfall deficit, which stood at 33% in June, has eased to 24% as July rains picked up, and the number of districts with low rainfall has fallen from 262 to 178. District-level contingency plans prepared through the Indian Council of Agricultural Research have been sent to 13 states, and efforts are being intensified to enrol more farmers under the Prime Minister’s crop insurance scheme and to speed up farm credit approvals.
He added that plans are also being readied to move fodder from surplus areas to deficit regions if the monsoon fails sharply. El Niño monitoring centres, crop-weather monitoring groups and state control rooms are continuing operations, with the Centre conducting daily reviews of monsoon progress, sowing and crop conditions.
