An unusually early, record-shattering heat wave in India has reduced wheat yields, raising
questions about how the country will balance its domestic needs with ambitions to increase
exports and make up for shortfalls due to Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Gigantic landfills in India’s capital New Delhi have caught fire in recent weeks. Schools in
eastern Indian state Odisha have been shut for a week and in neighboring West Bengal,
schools are stocking up on oral rehydration salts for kids. On Tuesday, Rajgarh, a city of over
1.5 million people in central India, was the country’s hottest, with daytime temperatures
peaking at 46.5 degrees Celsius (114.08 Fahrenheit). Temperatures breached the 45 C (113 F)
mark in nine other cities.
But it was the heat in March — the hottest in India since records first started being kept in
1901 — that stunted crops. Wheat is very sensitive to heat, especially during the final stage
when its kernels mature and ripen. Indian farmers time their planting so that this stage
coincides with India’s usually cooler spring.
Farm workers like Baldev Singh are among the most vulnerable. Singh, a farmer in
Sangrur in northern India’s Punjab state, watched his crop shrivel before his eyes
as an usually cool spring quickly shifted to unrelenting heat. He lost about a fifth
of his yield. Others lost more.
“I am afraid the worst is yet to come,” Singh said.
Punjab is India’s “grain bowl” and the government has encouraged cultivation of
wheat and rice here since the 1960s. It is typically the biggest contributor to India’s
national reserves and the government had hoped to buy about a third of this year’s
stock from the region. But government assessments predict lower yields this year,
and Devinder Sharma, an agriculture policy expert in northern Chandigarh city.
said he expected to get 25% less.
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