Despite the food ministry’s relaxation of norms for grain procurement hit by unseasonal rains, the country’s wheat crop in the 2025-26 crop year (July-June) is unlikely to be impacted by extreme weather conditions like heat stress and rains last month, the agriculture ministry said on Sunday.
The ministry stated unusually high temperatures in the month of February exposed the crop to heat stress, reducing grain filling duration and yield. Further, untimely rainfall and hail storms at maturity in a few areas last month have likely caused localised damage to grain quality and yield, it noted.
“It is anticipated that the adverse effects of weather anomalies will be largely compensated by increased area, early sowing, and improved varietal adoption, thereby supporting stable national wheat production as compared to the crop season of 2024-25,” according to the statement.
Previous estd output
Earlier, the ministry had estimated output of a record 120.21 million tonne (MT) in the 2025-26 crop year (July-June), an increase from 117.95 MT in 2024-25.
“The figure given by the agriculture ministry was 120 MT, but that was prior to the rainfall… The reality will be somewhere between 110 MT and 120 MT,” food secretary Sanjeev Chopra has stated last week in an event by the Roller and Flour Millers’ Federation of India.
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The federation through a survey by the agency – Agri-Watch had estimated wheat production for the current crop year at 110.65 MT, marginally higher than last year’s 109.63 MT, factoring in weather-related losses.
According to the ministry note, the wheat crop which was sown on an estimated area of 33.4 million hectares, had witnessed no incidence of insect pests and diseases during the season. Early and timely sowing of wheat in the country, had led to an increase in area over the last year.
“The additional 0.6 million hectares area planted during 2025-26, is expected to partially offset localized losses,” it stated, It noted that the current wheat season “may be characterized as mixed but resilient, shaped by both climatic adversities as well as strong adaptive measures undertaken by farmers,”.
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The survey report according to flour millers federation had stated that unseasonal rains, hailstorms, and harvest exposure in late March-early April 2026 hit Punjab and West Bengal hardest; Haryana, Bihar, and Rajasthan moderately.
The government agencies so far purchased 16.4 MT of wheat under minimum support price (MSP) purchase operations for 2026-27 marketing season (April-June) so far. The food ministry has revised upward its procurement target to 34.5 MT from an earlier target of 30 MT.
Recently the food ministry relaxed norms for the harvest hit by unseasonal rains in Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan — increasing the permissible limit to 15% from 6% for shrivelled and broken grains and up to 70% for lustre loss.
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