INDIA TO HARVEST RECORD MUSTARD CROP IN 2022-23

Udaipur : India is heading for a record Rapeseed-Mustard crop of 115.25 lakh tonnes in 2022-23 as remunerative prices in the past year encourage record plantings of the oilseed. Conducive weather in most parts of the mustard growing states also aided the highest-ever production. This was outcome of the Crop Survey conducted by the Solvent Extractors’ Association of India earlier this month.

Over the years, India has emerged as the world’s largest edible oil importer leading to a severe stress on its treasury as well as on farmers’ incomes. As a responsible and apex industry body, the SEA has initiated host of initiatives to raise the domestic availability of oilseeds. One of these initiatives, named “Model Mustard Farm Project” is being implemented with a vision to increase India’s Rapeseed-Mustard production to 200 Lakh tonnes by 2025-26.

The project has started showing positive results, as reflected in our recent crop survey for 2022-23 crop year. SEA has roped in RMSI Cropanalytics Pvt Ltd for the survey through two rounds of extensive crop surveys, remote sensing analysis for highest level of accuracy in crop area estimation.  The survey also included constant interactions with farmers from sowing through harvesting to ensuring the impact of all agronomic practices, selection of inputs, and weather is considering to arrive at the final estimate.  Total nine states such Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal were surveyed.

Based on the primarysurvey of nine major states and secondary survey of rest of the states, India’s rapeseed-mustard acreage for 2022-23 is estimated at 95.77 lakh hectares, which is lower than the Ministry of Agriculture’s estimate of 98.02 lakh hectares.

The average productivity for the year 2022-23 has been estimated at 1,203 kg/ha, leading to the totalmustard production at 115.25 lakh tonnes. The SEA had estimated the crop at 110 lakh tonnes in the previous year.

In the Second Advance Estimate dated Feb 14, the Ministry of Agriculture has estimated the crop at 128.18 lakh tonnes compared with 119.63 lakh tonnes in 2021-22.

Production in Rajasthan is estimated by SEA at 44.95 lakh tonnes, followed by Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh at 18.03 lakh tonnes and 16.69 lakh tonnes, respectively.