Conducive weather conditions in both India and Pakistan are helping them to achieve record wheat output this year, but India is better prepared than the neighbour to handle climate change impact as it has developed many indigenous heat-resistant and short-duration seed varieties, according to agri-scientists.
India is the second and Pakistan is the eighth largest wheat-producing country in the world. While India is self-sufficient in wheat output, the latter imports 2-3 million tonnes.
One of the reasons behind Pakistan still being dependent on imports to meet domestic requirements is its failure to develop indigenous varieties of climate-resilient seeds.
Presently, the harvesting of wheat crops is underway in both countries. India has projected wheat output to touch a new record of 114 million tonnes in the 2023-24 crop year (July-June), while Pakistan has set an ambitious target of 32.2 million tonnes from an area of 8.9 million hectares. While the two countries have been facing the adverse impact of climate change on wheat crop since 2010 onwards, the current year has been exceptionally favourable as there have been no events of terminal heat waves nor unseasonal rains affecting the crop.
“Climate has been favourable this year. During the crucial period of mid-January and February, there were no incidents of sudden heat waves, unseasonal rains, and lodging. We are expecting a bumper crop,” ICAR-Indian Institute of Wheat and Barley Research (ICAR-IIWBR) Director Gyanendra Singh told PTI.
He highlighted that climate-resilient wheat varieties have been sown in more than 80 per cent of the total wheat area of 34.15 million hectares this year because of the availability of newer seed varieties and also greater awareness among farmers.
Out of 600 indigenous wheat varieties released so far in India, Singh said as many as over 100 climate-resilient varieties are in the seed chain now. Around 14 new varieties were released in the current year itself.
According to Naresh Kumar, Principal Investigator at ICAR’s National Innovations in Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA), India is doing much better when compared to other countries in taking various agronomic measures such as changing planting dates and short-duration varieties besides promoting raised bed cultivation, sprinkler irrigation, and soil-water-nitrogen management.
Wheat crop is highly sensitive to temperature increases. Hot and unseasonal warm weather cut India’s wheat output in 2022 and 2023, leading to a drawdown in state reserves.
It is reported a 5.5 per cent decrease in wheat yield during the past 30 years (1980-2010) occurred due to a decadal temperature increase of 0.13 degree Celsius.
