India is forecasted to achieve record production of wheat (81.47 million tonnes), pulses (16.51 million tonnes) and cotton (339.27 lakh bales of 170 kg. each) this year.
The production of rice is projected to increase 5.5% to 94.01 million tonnes in 2010-11 compared to 89.13 million tonnes recorded during last year. The production of wheat is expected to increase 0.9% to record level of 81.47 million tonnes.
Coarse cereals are projected to witness 18.7% increase in output to 40.08 million tonnes in 2010-11, with maize production likely to increase 20.1% to 20.03 million tonnes.
The output of pulses is forecasted to increase 13.2% to 16.51 million tonnes, led by sharp 53.4% increase in the production of moong to 1.12 million tonnes and 24.7% surge in the production of tur to 3.18 million tonnes. The output of urad is also projected to increase sharply by 16.0% to 1.45 million tonnes during 2010-11.
Among the cash crops, the production of oilseeds is forecasted to increase 11.7% to 27.85 million tonnes with sharp 23.6% increase in the output of groundnut to 6.81 million tonnes. The production of soyabean is projected to increase 4.2% to 10.47 million tonnes during 2010-11.
The output of cotton is forecasted to surge 41.8% to record level of 33.93 million bales of 170 kg each.
Central Statistics Office (CSO) has estimated that the agriculture, forestry and fishery sector is likely to show a growth of 5.4% in its GDP during 2010-11, as against the previous year’s growth of 0.4%. The second advance estimates of crop production for 2010-11 confirm the findings of CSO. The CSO projection also indicates that the growth of GDP emanating from agriculture would be 6.6% against 3.8% growth recorded in the first half.
Flow of agriculture credit in 2010-11 is likely to reach Rs. 4 lakh crore, against the target of Rs. 3.75 lakh crore from the level of Rs. 86981 crore in 2003-04. MSPs of major crops such as paddy, wheat and pulses have increased by between 75% to 125% between 2004-05 and 2010-11.