Cultivation of paddy, pulses, coarse grains and oilseeds has expanded this kharif season, said the Agriculture Ministry in New Delhi on Monday (May 12, 2025), after a meeting chaired by Union Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan. As on May 2, sowing of paddy had increased by 3.44 lakh hectares while the sowing of pulses had increased by 2.20 lakh hectares as compared to the previous year, the Ministry said.

Till the aforementioned date in 2023-24, acreage of paddy was 28.57 lakh hectares while this year, it had risen to 32.02 lakh hectares. “Sowing of pulses has increased to 20.67 lakh hectares in 2024-25 as compared to 18.47 lakh hectares in 2023-24,” the Ministry said, adding that cultivation of popular varieties such as moong and urad had increased by 1.70 lakh hectares and 0.50 lakh hectares respectively.

Senior officials informed Union Agriculture Minister Mr. Chouhan in the meeting that there has been an increase in the sowing of onion and potato too in 2024-25 as compared to 2023-24. “There has been an increase of 2.82 lakh hectares in onion sowing, which is an increase from 9.76 lakh hectares in 2023-24 to 12.58 lakh hectares in 2024-25. The sowing area of ​​​​potato has also increased by 0.47 lakh hectares,” the Ministry said in a statement after the meeting. The sowing of tomato and onion is under way smoothly in the current season, according to the Ministry. Sowing of the three crops are going on in this season.

The meeting also reviewed the weather conditions and the availability of water in reservoirs. “The total water storage situation is better than last year. The storage available in 161 reservoirs is 117% of the storage in the same period last year and 114% of the average storage of the last 10 years,” the Ministry said.

On food grain stock, the Ministry said actual stock of rice and wheat is higher than the buffer standard. “The actual stock of rice is 389.05 lakh metric tonnes [LMT] against the buffer standard of 135.80 LMT. The actual stock of wheat is 177.08 LMT against the buffer standard of 74.60 LMT. Thus, the actual stock of rice and wheat is 566.13 LMT against the buffer standard of 210.40 LMT,” the Ministry said. The harvest of wheat in almost all major wheat-growing States was completed and there was no impact of heatwave or high temperature.

The meeting also decided to launch a campaign to promote scientific agriculture. Teams of agriculture scientists will visit about 700 villages in the country to promote technological innovations in agriculture.