80 per cent of samba paddy harvest over in Thanjavur, average yield 10 per cent higher than last year

THANJAVUR: While the unseasonal rain in the last week of January and early February this year affected samba and thalady paddy harvesting in the district, crop-cutting experiments undertaken by the Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Department in places other than rain-affected areas has so far shown the average yield to be 6,062 kg per hectare, which is 10.21% higher than last season’s 5,500 kg per hectare.

Of the 1,38,905 hectares on which samba and thalady paddy were cultivated in the district, the crop in 1,09,247 hectares has been harvested so far, which is about 80% of the total acreage. Of the total area cultivated, crop in 10,450 hectares was damaged in the unseasonal rain that lashed the delta districts in the last week of January and the first week of February.

Meanwhile, the crop-cutting experiments undertaken in 63 places, which excludes rain-affected areas, has shown the average yield to be 6,062 kg per hectare. This is marginally higher than the average yield of 5,500 kg per hectare achieved in the last samba season. S Antonysamy, a farmer from Palliagraharam, said he got a yield of 5,400 kg of fine variety per hectare which is good yield.

"The farmers of Thittai and Annappanpettai are also getting decent yield," he added. Those who cultivated common variety paddy ‘CR1009’ got a higher yield of around 6,000 kg per hectare, he also said. T Murugesan, a farmer from Maruthuvakudi, also said his cultivation of CR1009 variety returned a yield of around 6,000 kg per hectare. But for the unseasonal rain I would have got more yield, he added.

However, he said the yield of the ADT 51 variety was only 4,500 kg per hectare due to the rain early this year. P Sukumar, a farmer from Tiruppoonthuruthi, said that those who harvested the paddy within 10 days of Pongal festival got good yield. Those harvesting after that are getting reduced yield, he added.