The country’s groundnut crop is likely to come down to 37.35 lakh tonne for the season 2018-19 from 53.75 lakh tonne the previous season, according to estimates released by the Solvent Extractors Association of India (SEA) on Thursday. The acreage this season has marginally gone down to 40.14 lakh hectares from 41.49 lakh hectares. A groundnut crop survey conducted by SEA to assess the size and quality of the groundnut crop has shown that Gujarat is expected to harvest 15.95 lakh tonnes during kharif season, which is nearly half the production compared to last year.

Last year Gujarat produced 31.45 lakh tonnes. This season, the production is down mainly due to deficit rainfall, said BV Mehta, executive director, SEA, adding that the rain deficit has also affected the productivity across the country. groundnut

Groundnut is one of the major crops in kharif season and Gujarat is the one of the prominent states growing groundnut. A 17-member team that visited ground nut producing districts said that the first round of sowing took place in last week of June and second round of sowing took place around July 15, 2018 in Gujarat.

According to the team members, the rainfall was not satisfactory. The average rainfall in Saurashtra was 72.76% of normal average. Except Jungadh and Gir Somnath the rest of district received rainfall much below normal.

“The acreage under kharif groundnut in Gujarat marginally decreased to 14.68 lakh hectare from 16.00 lakh hectares last year and yield has decreased to 1,085 kg per hectare against 1,960 kg per hectare last year due to deficit rain in Gujarat,” Mehta said.

Rajasthan is second after Gujarat with an estimated production of 8.20 lakh tonnes this season followed by Andhra Pradesh and Telangana where the production is likely to touch 3.40 lakh tonnes.

Maharashtra is expected to produce 1.40 lakh tonnes as compared to 1.60 lakh tonnes last year while Karnataka is expected to produce 3.40 lakh tonnes.
Significantly, .Gujarat government has decided to buy groundnut in shell at MSP of Rs 1,001 per 20 kg against current market price of around Rs 800/950 per 20 Kg and allotted a sum of Rs 500 crore for the same.