Though the revival of monsoon over most parts of the country perked up hopes of the farm ministry to have a bumper kharif crop, it brought to the fore the shortage of space to store it.
As the government works overtime to have a food security law for the poor, lack of enough storage space results in wastage of huge amounts of food grains every year.
“The stock position this year is 60.8 million tonnes, which has never gone beyond 40 mt. If the current monsoon trend continues, there would be a serious storage problem,” food and agriculture minister Sharad Pawar said on Monday.
Storage is a big challenge for the government as godowns are already 90 per cent full with foodgrains. Wheat purchased for the Central pool is stored at the godowns maintained or hired by Food Corporation of India (FCI), Central Warehousing Corporation (CWC) and State Warehousing Corporations (SWCs).
As on January 1, 2010 the three organisations had 53.3 mt of foodgrains in their warehouses, which is 90 per cent of storage capacity of 59.5 mt. The country is likely to produce 80 million tonnes of wheat in the 2009-10 rabi season (October-June). Anticipating a shortfall of around 20 million tonnes worth of storage space in Rabi 2010, the foods ministry had asked the states to augment storage capacity by hiring private godowns. Creating new capacity would take some more years, said sources.
Thanking the rain gods, farm ministry officials expressed hope make up for the loss of rice crop last year due to severe drought, which affected around half of the country.
Rice production during kharif season in 2009 dipped by around 16 million tonnes.
Noting that the kharif sowing season, which started from June and will continue till September, was progressing well, the minister said acreage under rice, pulses, cotton, sugarcane and oilseeds has improved substantially.
Data available with the farm ministry showed paddy has been sown in 46.46 lakh hectare as on July 1, up from 45.43 lakh hectare during the same period.
Though sugarcane has been down at 47.37 lakh hectare, against 41.79 lakh hectare in 2009, cotton has been planted in 43.68 lakh hectare, against 29.17 lakh hectare last year. Similarly oilseeds have been sown in 28.86 lakh hectare against 12.96 lakh hectare last year.
Met department said the rains have reached every corner of the country and that even eastern and western Uttar Pradesh as well as Madhya Pradesh have received good rains.