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Dip in groundwater level hits crops in 1.5L acres
At least 1.5 lakh acres of standing crop has been damaged due to prevailing heat conditions. Officials blame fall in groundwater levels and drying up of wells sooner than expected as the main reason for the drought-like conditions
Hyderabad: At least 1.5 lakh acres of standing crop has been damaged due to prevailing heat conditions. Officials blame fall in groundwater levels and drying up of wells sooner than expected as the main reason for the drought-like conditions
Medak remains worst-hit by extensive crop damage.
According to officials, damage to the crops now was six times more as compared to the damage during the recent hail-storm and Medak district was the worst hit. According to officials, standing crop in 17 districts was badly affected accounting to a total crop damage of 1.5 lakh acres across the State. Amongst various crops, the standing crop of 1.45 lakh acres of paddy and 4079 acres of maize was reportedly damaged.
Amongst the new districts, Medak remains worst hit with 33,230 acres of damaged paddy, followed by Siddipet with 27,678 acres while Nizamabad, Jangaon and Karimnagar have an estimated damage of 18,038 acres, 10,907 acres and 10,608 acres respectively.
“The farmers who depend on groundwater resources through borewells are assumed to be at huge losses,” informed a higher official.A total of 18.32 lakh acres of paddy and maize across 197 mandals was sown which completely depended on borewells in the Rabi season that ended in March.
The damage of standing crops of 1.56 lakh acres are mostly from these areas while the crop loss under irrigation from tanks and canals are 5,725 acres and 287 acres respectively. The loss is in addition to the recent hail-storm, which caused a crop damage of 30,000 acres. The total area under paddy cultivation stood at 21.39 lakh acres for Rabi season.
“Following good rains during monsoon, this Rabi season saw almost four-fold increase for paddy in terms of area sown in the entire State. Farmers had hoped good yield during this season, but the groundwater levels dropped sooner than expected,” added the official.It may be recalled that the Kharif of 2016 which saw drought and delayed rainfall decreased the cultivation area by 89 per cent (18 lakh acres) of area sown as against 24.35 acres normally sown during the Kharif.
By Md Nizamuddin
