Cotton sowing likely to pick up soon in southern states

20-Jun-2024 09:01 PM

Coimbatore. With good monsoon rains and the announcement of minimum support price by the Central Government, the pace of cotton sowing is expected to increase in the southern states.

The government has increased the support price of cotton to Rs 7121 per quintal. In view of the slow pace of sale of cotton seeds in Maharashtra, a decline of 10-15 percent in the sowing area is being feared,

whereas monsoon has reached many parts of the state. Due to heavy rainfall earlier, early sowing of cotton could not be possible in large areas in the central and southern states of the country.

Cotton acreage is expected to decrease by 10 percent in Madhya Pradesh, but the situation in South India is not yet completely clear.

During the Kharif season of the year 2023, cotton was cultivated in a total of 124.69 lakh hectares at the national level.

Its area was recorded as 42.34 lakh hectares in Maharashtra, 26.83 lakh hectares in Gujarat and 18.18 lakh hectares in Telangana while the remaining sowing area was in Rajasthan, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, Orissa and Tamil Nadu.

Due to the weakening of the cotton futures price in New York Exchange, the enthusiasm of Indian producers towards cotton cultivation may cool down a bit.

Indian cotton producers keep an eye on this and take the decision of sowing after carefully studying and analyzing the daily fluctuations in the futures price. The cotton futures price for December contract in ICE,

New York fell to 70 cents per pound yesterday which is equivalent to Rs 47,000 per candy (356 kg) in Indian currency. On the other hand, the price of 29 mm long staple cotton in India is currently running between Rs 55,000-57,000 per candy.