India may achieve record wheat output this year

NEW DELHI: The country is likely to witness bumper wheat production in 2008-09, breaching the last year's record of 78.40 million tonnes, on the back of higher sowing even as the target of raising area under the grain by 10 lakh hectares may be missed, says a top government official.

"Wheat production may be slightly more than the last year. The area under wheat is likely to be marginally higher, too," Agriculture Secretary T Nanda Kumar said here on Thursday on the sidelines of a function.

However, conducive weather in February holds the key to any major increase in the output, he added.

Wheat acreage rose marginally to 269.7 lakh hectares till January 8, compared with 265.76 lakh hectares in the same period last year. Area under wheat touched a record 281.5 lakh hectares in the 2007-08 rabi season.

However, with the sowing of wheat nearing end, the government's target of raising the wheat acreage to 290 lakh hectares this year is likely to be missed.

"This year we had around 2.4 million hectares which could have gone to wheat. But farmers started sowing other crops such as mustard and chana. You can't dictate farmers," Kumar said.

The production of mustard is set to be higher than the last year mainly due to better sowing. Area under mustard has increased to 66.24 LH till January 8 from 57.74 LH in the year-ago period, he said.

Though the country has achieved record foodgrain output and posted a growth rate of 4.5 per cent in agriculture in 2007-08, the expansion may slow down this year.