Plans afoot for higher procurement of paddy

Against planned area of 42L acres, paddy extent likely to be 55L acres

With the cultivation of paddy during the ongoing kharif (vanakalam) season in Telangana set to go beyond the extent proposed, the State government has started its efforts to convince the Food Corporation of India (FCI) to lift more rice grown this season. As the farming community have gone by their intuition and preferred paddy and maize over cotton and redgram, the extent of major cereal crop is now estimated to go up to 55 lakh acres against nearly 42 lakh acres proposed. With a view to handle the higher production, Minister for Agriculture S. Niranjan Reddy held a meeting with the officials of Civil Supplies, Marketing and FCI here on Tuesday and discussed the issue. As per the revised estimates of paddy extent, the production is likely to be about 1.48 crore tonnes at the rate of 27 quintals yield per acre. The Minister stated that the FCI had already agreed to lift 60 lakh tonnes of paddy (rice milled from it). The State government would seek an additional procurement of 15-20 lakh tonnes.