Sowing of crops in the ongoing Kharif season picked up modestly over the past week, spurred by a stronger monsoon in parts of the country. Data showed the weekly acreage deficit narrowed to 20.8% as of July 5.India recorded its fifth-driest June in more than a century this year. (AP)The corresponding figure for last week was 22.7%. Experts expect planting to accelerate further over the week, even as the India Meteorological Department (IMD) forecast rainfall across key growing regions over the next five days.Data from the agriculture ministry showed that as of July 5, 44.3 million hectares of arable land was occupied by Kharif crop. The Southwest monsoon’s delayed onset and uneven progress across the country slowed planting early in the season. Acreage under all major Kharif crops, including rice, pulses, coarse cereals, oilseeds and cotton, remained below last year’s levels. The area under paddy crop logged a 13% decrease to 6 million hectares. Oilseed planting logged the steepest decline of 40%, with 6 million hectares under cultivation. Soybean, India’s largest oilseed crop, accounted for much of the fall, with sowing down almost 40% to 4.8 million hectares.Economist Ramesh Chand noted that crops with higher irrigation coverage, such as rice, logged smaller declines, while largely rain-fed crops such as soybean and pulses were hit harder. “About three-fourths of the area under rice is irrigated, compared with barely 9% for soybean. The acreage numbers reflect this difference. The same relationship holds true for pulses,” he said. The pulses crop registered a 22% decline from last year.Although IMD expects July rainfall to account for 94% of the long-period average (LPA), experts said the timing and spatial distribution of rainfall would be more important for the sowing of crops than the monthly aggregate.“So far, about 340 districts are rain deficient, while 64 are large deficient (down 60-99% of LPA). For several crops, what is needed is a round of rain which can bring moisture to the soil pre-sowing, and then some intermittent rain. Even those districts that remain deficient will do fine as a result. With almost another week of rain left, I foresee several of the 64 large deficient districts also being covered, which will provide a chance to make up for the delay in sowing,” said former agriculture secretary Devesh Chaturvedi.Cotton crop also logged a 23% decline in acreage. The area under sugarcane cultivation, however, rose by 1.5% to 5.8 million hectares.This year’s June was the fifth-driest logged in over a century in India, with only 99.5 millimetres of rainfall recorded. The driest June on record was logged in 2009. However, the monsoon has staged a recovery in July, with the country’s rainfall deficit narrowing to about 20% of the long-period average (LPA) as of July 6.