Farmers told to go in for short-term crops

COIMBATORE: In light of the delayed southwest monsoon and severe rainfall deficit, agriculture experts have advised farmers to go in for short-term crops this year as they require less water.
"We are telling them to move from their traditional crops and try short-term crops like pulses, millets, sunflower or maize," said K Velayutham, director of crop management at TNAU.Except for maize, the cycle for the other three crops is less than 90 days, he added.
"More importantly they consume less water," said K Paneer Selvam, director, agro-climate research department, TNAU.
Thanks to this advisory, Saraswathi Ramakrishnan, who has been cultivating sugarcane for the last 12 years on her eight-acre farm in Poosaripalayam, is now considering a different crop. "I want to try cultivating pulses on one acre and see how it does," she said.
Historically, Coimbatore, considered the state's cotton belt, is known for its cultivation of paddy, sugarcane and coconut trees. All are long-duration crops, requiring anywhere between 160 days to three years for the first yield.
Though cotton cultivation has come down to negligible levels, coconut farms still occupy 82,704 hectares or nearly 47% of the agricultural land in the region.
"Paddy is cultivated on 2,629 hectares and sugarcane is grown on 1,484 hectares," said Velayudham. They also require a lot of water, he added. While cotton requires 160 days to mature, sugarcane requires 11 months to a year to mature and some varieties of paddy require 150 days for the same.
Though farmers primarily depend on the northeast monsoons between October and December, the southwest monsoons help augment its water requirements.
In Coimbatore, with irrigation being done through bore wells, groundwater in some regions has fallen anywhere below 400ft and 1,000ft, according to TNAU professors.
Since short-term crops like millets went out of vogue due to low yields and prices compared to paddy and maize, researchers are now coming out with high-yielding varieties of short-term crops. "We now have hybrid seeds which give a yield that matches that of maize and paddy," said Dr Shafee Ahmed, a millet researcher at the university.
Farmers, who have been battling the water deficit for the past two years along with labour shortage, are also beginning to try new crops. "Since I closely follow TNAU's met department readings, I knew that the rains would be inadequate this year," said K Manickam, a coconut farmer in Pollachi. "I have already seen the yield falling continuously over the years. So this year I made a very difficult decision, bringing down 84 of the 350 coconut trees I own," he said.
The state is facing its worst drinking water crisis this year, with rainfall being 20% short of its expectations. A large portion of the 15,000-odd acres of agricultural land dependent on the Kalingarayan canal for water saw its crops completely drying up without rain and ground water, said V K Shanmugam, who heads the association of farmers owning land around the canal.