THIS year’s monsoon, that came a bit late, have caused less damage to key crops than they could if they had arrived earlier. Cotton has fallen victim to rainfall, sugarcane has rather benefited from it — and paddy has undergone a mixed experience.

By mid-August the country had received light rains in parts of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. So, young cotton crop was not damaged and paddy also remained almost unhurt. The real downpour came between the second half of August and the first half of September. By this time cotton crop in Sindh had become strong enough to withstand the rainfall wherever its intensity was not so strong and penetrating.

But in parts of Punjab where the plants had not attained full height heavy rains battered them. And in some areas where rains caused flooding of rivers and canals cotton growth was affected.

In places where paddy was being replanted the rains washed away the young and weak saplings. But where re-plantation had already taken place by mid-August and paddy stalks had grown stronger the story was different. As for sugarcane, the entire monsoon spell proved a blessing in disguise. Sugarcane stalks have become stronger after absorbing additional water. And agriculturists say it would help boost the sucrose content i.e. sugar millers would be able to extract more sugar out of canes.

Growers say that in most of the cotton producing districts of Sindh the crop is ready for harvesting and was thus strong enough to avoid damages of rains. In fact harvesting has already started. But they fear that in Punjab where cotton crop is less mature than that of Sindh heavy rains might reduce its size.

“On brighter side, the heavy rainfall may kill white fly and this may somewhat compensate the loss in crop size due to excessive rains,” says an executive member of Pakistan Cotton Growers Association (PCGA) Mr. Ihsan ul Haq. White fly is the insect vector of infamous cotton leaf curl virus. Field reports suggest that main cotton producing districts of Punjab, including Rahimyar Khan, Bahawalpur, Multan, Vehari, Lodhran, and Khanewal are partly under the virus attack.

Cotton has reportedly been under virus attack also in such parts of Sindh like Ghotki, Sukkur, Khairpur, Naushehro Feroze and Benazirabad. There too heavy rains may rid the crop of the virus.

Growers as well as the officials of provincial agriculture departments are trying to estimate the loss of cotton crop because of rains. But guesstimates vary from half a million bales to one million bales. That means, Pakistan will end up producing about at least 15 million bales .Before the rains cotton experts were expecting the crop to yield 15.5-16 million bales this year.

According to PCGA, ginneries across Pakistan have already received 1.731 million bales of cotton up to September 1 including 968,000 bales from Punjab and 763,000 bales from Sindh. Last year the arrivals up to September 1 were not officially released but PCGA sources say they were less than a million bales.

A member of Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association Mr Ghulam Rabbani believes that rains would not cause a big damage to cotton crop because many growers in Sindh and Punjab had sown biotech and new cotton varieties that are virus-resistant and also give larger yields.

Agriculturists say that the heavy rains between mid-August and mid-September have further brightened the scope for a large sugarcane crop this year. They say that this year’s harvest would be somewhere around 62-63 million tonnes against that of 58 million tonnes in the last year.

“Rains between mid-July and mid-August had already strengthened sugarcane stalks. Heavier rains in the last one month would further fatten the canes and boost sucrose content,” a progressive cane grower in district Khairpur of Sindh told Dawn. In Sindh, sugarcane normally has more sucrose compared to the canes grown in Punjab. Growers say that heavy rains are expected to improve sucrose content proportionally in Sindh as well as in Punjab. Sugarcane harvesting is likely to start from mid-October in most parts of Sindh and from early November in Punjab.

Paddy crops, of Irri-6 and Irri-9, have been hit by heavy rains both in Sindh and Punjab. But the damage done varies from mild to severe depending upon the maturity of the crop which was sown relatively late this year due to water shortage.

Growers say that where these non-Basmati varieties had been replanted before mid-August and where rainfall had not been very heavy or had not been accompanied by flooding the crop has been hit only slightly. But where they had not been replanted, like in some parts of Punjab, or where they were just being replanting as in some parts of Sindh, heavy rains combined with overflowing rivers and canals have damaged the crop.

“Many like me in Ghotki had even hired workers for coarse rice thrashing in Sindh in August as we were expecting that harvesting would start in September,” said a Ghotki-based rice trader Namal Das who buys paddy from rice fields and help rice mills in their thrashing on contract basis. “Harvesting has delayed now and may not begin until the third week of this month.”

As for Basmati varieties, heavy rains have not hit the crop much because of two reasons. First, after experiencing last year’s heavy rains and flooding, growers had taken maximum care of saving the crop from their ill effects. Secondly, Basmati fields in Sindh, Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and in some parts of Balochistan are generally not located in low-lying areas and draining out rain water is easier there.

Harvesting of Basmati normally begins after the harvesting of Irri-6 and Irri-9. Growers say they will begin reaping this year’s crop sometime in mid or late October in Sindh and parts of Punjab and late as in November in most parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Pakistan has set 6.9 million tonnes of milled rice target for the current cropping year. An official of federal food security and research ministry says it is difficult to predict precisely whether the target would be met “but even if there is any slippage it would not be that big.”

Growers’ groups fear that late sowing of paddy in Sindh and Punjab due to water shortage and then belated medium to heavy rainfall may have a mixed impact on rice output and they too believe it is premature now to assess the impact of rains on overall paddy production. —Mohiuddin Aazim