According to the rainfall data from the Department of Agriculture, Vellore city has been experiencing good rains, starting with the highest of 62.1 mm on June 1, 3.5 mm on June 2 and 6.4 mm on June 4.
Farmers are upbeat and are proceeding with farming confidently, said Natarajan, a farmer of Gudiyattam. Following rains last month, some of the farmers across the district had started ploughing their fields to sow rain-fed crops such as groundnut, while others started the activity following the recent showers. A cross section of the farmers expressed hope that they would be able to take up groundnut cultivation this year much before the Samba season.
Officials sources said the district has an annual target of paddy cultivation on 62,000 hectares (ha), millets on 35,000 ha, pulses on 37,000 ha, oil seeds on 53,000 ha, cotton on 8,000 ha, sugarcane on 11,000 ha, besides horticulture crops such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, and other plantation crops on 35,000 ha. Except the cotton crop that had exceeded the target in the Tirupattur, all other crops had a setback in yields, ranging from 10 to 50 per cent.
Officials said farmers would be motivated to start cultivating various crops right from the beginning of the seasons. They also said besides paddy, millets and pulses that would be planted across the district, small millet ‘samai’ would be cultivated on a trial basis on the plains, instead of the conventional way of cultivating the crop in high altitude areas.