New Delhi:Winter-sown crops output will be good and will help bring down high food prices, the agriculture minister said on Wednesday.
“I am absolutely confident of a very good winter crop. A good winter crop will help food prices ease,” Sharad Pawar told parliamement.
Farmers in India, the second-biggest producer of wheat and rice in the world, plant winter-sown crops such as wheat and rapeseed from October. Harvests begin in March.
Pawar said food prices have already started falling.
India’s food price index rose 17.58% in the 12 months to 13 February, the government said last week. The rise was lower than an annual rise of 17.97% in the previous week.
A senior scientist at the farm ministry said last month 2010 wheat harvest was expected at record 82 million tonnes, up from a previous forecast of 80.2 million tonnes due to good weather conditions.