India's agriculture sector can grow 6% in case of normal monsoon this year: NITI Aayog

New Delhi: Agricultural growth can touch 6 per cent in 2016-17 if the country receives normal monsoon rains this year, a member of the government's premier think-tank, Niti Aayog, has said.

"After two back-to-back drought years, we should not be surprised if we achieve 6 per cent agriculture growth in 2016-17," Niti Aayog's Ramesh Chand said, adding that higher growth was recorded after the drought years 2003-04 and 2010-11.

Monsoon rains (June to September) remained deficit in 2014-15 and 2015-16 at 12 per cent and 14 per cent, respectively. The India Meteorological Department's forecast for 2016-17 is expected in the last week of April.

"The closest inference we can take is from 2010-11, when agriculture growth was 8.6 per cent. This was after 2008-09 recorded 0.09 per cent agriculture growth rate, and 2009-10 when agriculture growth was 0.81 per cent," he said.

The drought in India in 2009 was the worst the country had faced in 37 years. Chand said the worst growth rate seen in the past few years was in 2002-03 when agriculture growth was a negative 6.6 per cent. "We bounced back the next year in 2003-04 with 9 per cent agriculture growth," he said.

Although nearly half of India's population has its livelihood in the agricultural sector, Agriculture contributes about 14 per cent to India's economic output, despite nearly half of the country's population being involved in farm-related activities.

A poor monsoon has a ripple effect on the rural economy and demand for consumer goods. Healthy growth in the agriculture is also good news for the fast moving consumer goods segment, which gets about a third of its sales from rural areas.

"If monsoon is on time and has a normal spread, then the area under cultivation will be more and production will increase, leading to growth." said Chand.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.