Description

India is blessed with favourable agro-ecological conditions for the growth of wide range of cultivated, perennial and annual oilseeds. Oilseeds constitute the second largest agricultural commodity in India after cereals. In India about 27.46 m ha area is under oilseeds cultivation. Out of the total cultivated area 80 per cent is occupied by nine major annual oilseed crops. The annual production of these nine major oilseed crops is around 15.23 m tonnes. Despite the fact that India is one of the leading oilseed producing country in the world, it is not able to meet the surging demand created due to the components, namely population increase, change in living standard of people and stagnation in production.Among the different oilseed crops grown in the country, rapeseed and mustard stands huge importance. This has been major source of edible oil for the masses particularly in northern India. It is ultivated both under irrigated (79.2%) and rainfed conditions (20.8%) in an area of 0.88 m ha with a production of around 0.99 m tonnes.