Gujrat: Cyclone Gulab damages Indian crops just before harvesting
Heavy rains brought by Hurricane Gulab have damaged Indian crops planted in the summer such as soybeans, cotton, vegetable and vegetable clusters just before harvest in key growing regions, which could reduce productivity and inflation, industry officials told Reuters.
Low production could force India, the world's largest importer of edible oils and pulses, to increase imports of these commodities, and could also reduce cotton exports to the world's leading producer.
Hurricane Gulab, which originated in the Bay of Bengal, was hit by the east coast on Sunday and weakened by deep-seated rains that brought heavy rains to the southern states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and to the western provinces of Maharashtra and Gujarat.
"I was hoping for a good bean crop and a good return as the price of beans was attractive," said 35-year-old farmer Anand Mane from Latur in Maharashtra. "But before the harvest, the rains came and destroyed everything," said Mane, who damaged bean and sugarcane crops on eight acres, resulting in the loss of more than 250,000 rupees.
Maharashtra, the world's second-largest producer of soybeans, cotton, sugarcane and the world's leading producer of summer seeds, received 381% more rainfall than usual on Tuesday.
Farmers have expanded areas under soybeans, but rainfall is slowing down productivity growth, said David Jain, chairman of the Soybean Processors Association of India.
The industry official expected India to produce more than 10 million tons of beans by 2021, up from 8.9 million tons last year. But rain damage could reduce the rise to 9.5 million tons, says a trader who owns a global trading company.
The leading cotton-producing provinces have received heavy rainfall over the past four days, which has severely affected the harvesting, said Chirag Patel, chief executive officer of Jaydeep Cotton Fibers Pvt Ltd, a leading retailer. “Within a week the cotton production situation changed. We were expecting a high yield, but now the yield will go down and the yield rate would be lower in the beginning, ”said Patel.
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