BHUBANESWAR: The State is expecting a bumper harvest of foodgrains this year despite crop loss in several Southern Odisha districts due to cyclone Hudhud.
The Agriculture Department has projected a foodgrain production of over 100 lakh tonnes after first round of advance estimates.
Projecting an yield of 2350 kg per hectare (ha), the Department has estimated rice production at 84.60 lakh tonnes. The State had achieved a record rice production of 86 lakh tonnes during 2012-13 kharif season as against 76.55 lakh tonnes in 2007-08.
The crop-wise first advance estimate released by the Department showed a total cereal output of 94.73 lakh tonnes including 10.14 lakh tonnes of coarse cereals, 8.34 lakh tonnes of maize and 1.62 lakh tonnes of ragi.
While 36 lakh ha are under paddy cultivation during kharif, the total area covered under cereal production is 41.11 lakh ha.
Expecting a good harvest of pulses, the State Government has projected a total production of 5.82 lakh tonnes. The preliminary estimate put the production of arhar at 1.90 lakh tonnes, 1.75 lakh tonnes of biri (black gram), 1.09 lakh tonnes of mung and nearly 70,000 tonnes of other pulses, including cow pea.
The foodgrains production figure is likely to change by more than 20 per cent after the final estimate, said a senior officer of the Agriculture and Food Production Directorate.
The Department has estimated a total oilseeds production of 3.10 lakh tonnes as against 2.55 lakh tonnes during last year. It has projected a production of 1.51 lakh tonnes of groundnut, 1.12 lakh tonnes of til and over 40,000 tonnes of niger.
Director of Agriculture and Food Production S Gopalan attributed the higher productivity to increased seed replacement rate (SRR), use of chemical fertilisers and organic manure and integrated pest, soil and water management.
The intensive drive by the Department has yielded better results with more farmers getting encouraged to adopt location-specific high yielding varieties of paddy seeds having resistance to pest and abiotic stress, he added.
Besides, the system of rice intensification (SRI) methodology for cultivation is gaining popularity among farmers as they get better production of rice than conventional methods of sowing and transplantation.