Hyderabad, November 04: Rice production in Andhra Pradesh is likely to fall to as low as 48.75 lakh tonnes this year because of drought, Chief Minister K Rosaiah said on Tuesday.
The state produced 83.8 lakh tonnes of rice last year, the Chief Minister said, quoting the advanced estimates provided by the Economics and Statistics Department.
Rosaiah was interacting with a high-level inter-ministerial team from the Centre, headed by Joint Secretary (seeds) in the Agriculture Ministry, Upma Chowdhry, at the state Secretariat here.
The Chief Minister explained to the team in detail the impact of drought in the state.
As against the normal 392.8 mm, the state received 27 per cent deficit rainfall till the end of the south-west monsoon period on September 30. Consequently, the state declared 981 mandals in 22 districts as drought-affected.
Crop area came down to 63.42 lakh hectares as against the normal 71.84 lakh hectares during the kharif season. By end of the kharif season, crops in 13.63 lakh had got damaged out of the total sown area, Rosaiah told the team.
Milk and fodder output too suffered as a consequence of the drought, he added. Rosaiah said the state was seeking a grant of Rs 9,053.19 crore from the National Calamity Contingency Fund to tackle the situation.
The state government has so far sanctioned a sum of Rs 556.96 crore to meet immediate requirements, Rosaiah said.
The Chief Minister appealed to the team to “take a humanitarian and liberal view of the suffering of the people while making your recommendations to the Government of India given the severity of the drought.”
Responding to the Chief Minister’s plea, Chowdhry said this was one of the larger inter-ministerial teams that has been sent to any state considering the gravity of drought.
“We are here to asses the problems and make our recommendations to the Centre. We will be reasonable and very fair and will do our best,” she said.
The Central team will be divided into five groups and visit the districts to assess the situation. It will return to Hyderabad on November 6.
-Agencies