Prolonged dry spell delays sowing of Rabi crops

The prolonged dry spell has delayed the sowing of Rabi crops, mainly cereals like wheat, barley and gram across the state. The sowing season for these cereals begins from October 15 onwards, but lack of rains for over a month now has forced farmers to delay the sowing.

“The Agriculture Department had convened a meeting of deputy directors of all 12 districts on October 30. According to them, only 5-7 per cent sowing had been done by then. The situation is more or less the same even now as there has been no change in weather,” said an official from the Agriculture Department.

While maintaining that the situation wasn’t critical at the moment, the agriculture officials say the delayed sowing could have some impact on the overall yield. The impact, they say, would enhance if there was no rain in another 7-10 days. “With delayed sowing, the growing period gets shorter and the overall production is affected,” said Dev Raj Kashyap, Deputy Director, Solan.

Raj Kumar, Deputy Director, Sirmaur, said the farmers have the choice to opt for mid and late sown seeds in case the there’s not the required moisture in the soil to sow the early-sown variety. “The sowing of early-sown variety has been delayed. If it doesn’t rain until November 15, the farmers can shift to mid-sown and late-sown varieties which take lesser time to mature,” said the Deputy Director.

“And in case around 60 per cent of the sowing season is over without any rainfall, we turn to contingency plan and advise the farmers to opt for other suitable crop at that time,” he said.

Unlike cereals, there’s not much impact yet on vegetable grown at this time. As per the agriculture officials, vegetables are cultivated mostly where the farmers have water for irrigation. Nevertheless, the farmers who have sown garlic are facing some problems.

“The germination of garlic has been affected by the lack of moisture in the soil,” said the Deputy Director.