A longstanding development of farmers preferring cereal crops over scarce pulses and oilseeds has been bolstered by a craze for maize and its space exhibits a meteoric rise over the previous few years.
Corn is a brand new favorite amongst growers attributable to its use in making ethanol for India’s high-priority biofuels programme. This summer season, farmers have sown extra maize than in any of the previous 5 years.
The full space has jumped to 9.8 million hectares, which represents a 17% rise in the identical interval, newest official knowledge confirmed. Output can also be quick rising, rising by 11% in 2024-25 to just about 1 / 4 of 1,000,000 tonnes.
Cultivators appear to be responding to measures to advertise maize or corn as the subsequent large business crop, after wheat and rice, to bolster its power safety via bumper harvests.
The nation final month achieved the milestone of assembly its goal of blending 20% ethanol with petrol, early by 4 months, on the again of beneficial coverage steps to show extra of surplus rice in addition to maize into the alcohol compound. Ethanol can also be constructed from molasses, a by-product of sugar.
The biofuels programme has seen an enormous success though car-owners say blended gasoline tends to chop gasoline financial system. In 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had superior the goal of mixing petrol with 20% ethanol by 5 years to 2025, referred to as the E20 programme, to chop emissions and save as much as $4 billion in oil imports yearly.
The technique has saved India almost ₹1.40 lakh crore in crude import prices between 2014 and 2024, in accordance with the information, serving to reduce 54.4 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions in the identical interval.
India goals to lift corn manufacturing by 10 million tonnes over the subsequent 5 years as demand for ethanol manufacturing grows, moreover increased demand from the poultry trade, which makes use of it as feed.
“The thought is that step by step, ethanol from sugarcane will plateau and grains reminiscent of maize will probably be used as a replacement,” a petroleum ministry official mentioned, requesting anonymity.
Scientists on the Indian Institute of Maize Analysis are attempting out new experiments to make high-yielding seeds below a federal programme to lift productiveness by a large margin, Hanuman Sahay Jat, the institute’s director, had instructed HT just lately.
Oil advertising firms achieved the 20% objective in July, after having reached 19.92% within the earlier month, with an output of 66 billion litres of ethanol throughout 2024-25, in accordance with official knowledge. Of this, 25.5 billion litres got here from grains and the remaining from sugarcane.
Farmers have all the time most well-liked cereals due to higher worth realisation for rice and winter-grown wheat, produced in surplus since they’re bought by the federal government on the minimal help worth (MSP).
The bottom worth for maize, barely greater than paddy, stands at ₹2,400 a quintal (100kg), an 83% improve over the value in 2013-14. MSP is a federally set ground worth that gives at the very least 50% revenue over value.
“I switched to maize from soyabean final 12 months, after I got here to learn about good earnings from farmers in Uttar Pradesh,” mentioned Virender Singh Tomar, a grower in Madhya Pradesh’s Neemuch.
Distilleries making ethanol have ramped up purchases after the federal government allowed a rise within the worth of ethanol, one of many the explanation why farmers are rising extra. In January, the federal government hiked the ex-mill worth of ethanol from ₹57.97 per litre, up from ₹56.58 per litre.
Backed by a plentiful monsoon, planting of cereals, particularly rice and maize, has far outstripped that of pulses and oilseeds this 12 months too.
