BANGALORE: Lack of rain and crop loss had resulted in a crop pattern change in Gadag. Farmers are switching to cultivating cereals in lieu of pulses and oilseed .
In Gadag, the average rainfall between January and April in Mundargi, Nargund and Shirhatti taluk are 10.3mm, 8.7mm and 11.4mm respectively. However, this year, these areas received 4.8mm, 2.1mm and 0.9mm of rainfall, respectively. This had affected more than 50 per cent of the crops cultivated.
According to the data obtained from H K Patil Krishi Vignan Kendra, greengram, is the prime crop in Gadag. Spread over 58,700 hectares of area in 2009, green gram cultivation constituted around 23 per cent of the total area.
However, in 2012, the crop is cultivated across 43,600 hectares of land.
The production has reduced to 6,100 metric tonnes in 2010-11 from 61,830 metric tonnes in 2005-06.
In 2011-12, around 80 percent of the crop were affected by the drought. Production of other crops like sunflower, groundnut and chilli also reduced.
Farmers have shifted from cultivating oilseed and pulses to cereals like maize and wheat.
Experts believe that the change in the crop pattern is due to the price factor and is not demand driven.
“The farmers are getting good prices for maize and wheat and there is a value addition for such crops. The change in crop pattern will be mainly following the prices prevailing in the previous years. The prevailing minimum support price for green grams is around Rs 2,000 while it is as high as Rs 5,800 in places like Mysore and Shimoga,” said Prof M Mahadevappa, member of Governing Council at Indian Council of Agricultural Research.
So, people will shift to crop, which are more profitable and stable, he added.However, programme coordinator at KVK Gadag Dr L G Hiregoudar, said that the contractors at the APMC are exploiting the market by lowering the price often without any regulation. This forced farmers to ignore crops that will not fetch good prices.