Hyderabad: As the poor South West monsoon recedes by this month end, the cropped area in TS reached 80 per cent of the normal area with Medak recording the least cropped area of 71 per cent. Intermittent rains and long dry spells hit almost all crops especially water intensive paddy.
The total cropped area touched 33,30,672 hectares as on date as against season’s normal of 41,43,302 — 7,73,611 irrigated area and 25,57,061 rain fed area.
Water intensive paddy, was the worst hit. Total area sown under paddy was 4.89 lakh hectares as against the season’s normal of 10.59 lh. A big chunk of 4.87 lakh hectares of paddy was planted in irrigated area and only 0.01 lakh hectares in rain fed area.
Total food grains was sown in 12.76 lh as against the season’s normal of 20.65 lh. While Nizamabad district recorded the highest cultivation of 95 per cent of the normal cropped area, the least cropped area was Mahabubnagar 72 per cent, Warangal 77 per cent and RR district 78 per cent respectively.
