Widespread rainfall across north and central India, particularly Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, could impact wheat, mustard, jowar, grapes and vegetable production and quality. At the same time, the weather conditions are beneficial for Apple, cherry and pear crops. "Hailstorms accompanied with rain have created a massive loss. Farmers may see losses from 10-100%," said Sopan Kanchan, president of the Grape Growers Association of India. According to him, the worst-hit place is Nashik, one of the top grape producing regions in the country. Farmers will suffer huge losses as harvesting is going on, he said. Maharashtra produces 12-15 lakh tonnes of grape a year.

The met department forecast rain and snow to continue over Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and parts of Uttarakhand over the next 24 hours. Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh will also receive rainfall in the next 24 hours before the weather system heads northeast, it said. Harvesting of wheat has started in Gujarat, Maharashtra and Karnataka. Indu Sharma, director of the Wheat Research Institute at Karnal, said teams would go out to fields on Monday to assess losses across the country.

"Rains from now onwards are not beneficial for wheat as water-logging will impact the crop," she said. "In central India, there should not be much negative impact as the crop is mature, but there could be lustre loss. Further rains could lead to discolorisation also, leading to farmers getting lower returns." On the overall position for the country, she said there may not be huge losses. Vegetable crop nurseries for summer plants have been destroyed at some places, said Sriram Gadhawe, president of the Vegetable Growers Association of India.

"Vegetable prices in the short term may increase. We have yet to see if any major damage has occurred on onion crop," he added. In the hill states, meanwhile, farmers and scientist said they were happy with the snowfall and rains. "Lower temperature from December 30 will allow the plants to have moisture for a long time till May," said SP Bhardwaj, a horticulture expert from Himachal Pradesh. "We should look at a bumper production.

Source - http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/