Farmers advised to go for alternative crops

Ongole: The Prakasam district administration has advised the farmers under the Nagarjuna Sagar right canal to consider alternative crops for the Kharif as sufficient water for irrigation purposes is not available in the Nagarjuna Sagar reservoir.

In a note released on Wednesday, the superintending engineer of the irrigation circle Lakshmareddy informed that they are providing water for irrigation under Nagarjuna Sagar right canal to cover 103567 acres of wetland and 150825 acres of dryland in five assembly constituencies, along with drinking water to 98 village drinking water tanks, and 5 summer storage tanks in the urban area in the district. He explained that though the Nagarjuna Sagar project has a full capacity of 312.05 TMC and dead storage of 131.67 TMC, there is only 153.50 TMC water stored in it by Wednesday. He said that as there is no flood water to the Nagarjuna Sagar project for 2023-24 yet, the three-member committee of the Krishna River Management Board advised in its meeting on August 21, 2023, to utilize the available water for the drinking water needs only.

Lakshmareddy announced that though the water for Kharif crops in Prakasam would be released in September when the project is being filled with flood water, the situation is against it now. Taking note of the prevailing conditions, he said that the agriculture department of the Prakasam district has prepared a list of rainfed alternative crops for the kharif season to cultivate by the farmers of the total 254392 acres registered ayacut under the Nagarjuna Sagar right canal in the district. He informed that the water may be released to the right canal in future for the drinking water needs and warned the farmers to not use it for agricultural needs.

The agriculture department advised the farmers to cultivate red gram, corn, cotton, sorghum, pearl millets, foxtail millets, finger millet, groundnut, caster oil, black gram, and cowpeas as alternative crops for the kharif season.