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Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday said that the monsoon rains have picked up and it is just eight per cent below average. It revived during the second half of the season. The June-September monsoon rains were about 12 percent below average until the end of August. Rains below 90 percent of long-term averages are considered deficient-drought in general terms. Speaking at the inaugural address of the national conclave on micro irrigation here, Pawar noted that the weak rains in drought-hit areas would still result in lower output for summer-planted coarse cereals and pulses, adding that micro irrigation is the solution to the depleting ground water levels. “The ground water table in the country has come down in the last few years and in order to check this we should work with technologies like drip and sprinkler irrigation, which minimises loss of water,” he said. He further emphasised upon the need to encourage drip and sprinkler irrigation in the country, and added that the government has implemented the National Mission on Micro Irrigation (NMMI) to propagate the use of this technology among the farmers.

Monsoon shortfall eight per cent: Sharad Pawar