India set for record wheat planting as soil moisture and prices rise

MUMBAI, Nov 19 (Reuters): Indian farmers are set to expand wheat acreage by about 5 per cent to a record high, aided by higher returns and October's untimely rains, which improved soil moisture and encouraged a shift from rainfed crops to the cereal, industry officials told Reuters.
The higher planting is expected to help the world's second-largest wheat producer boost output, ease local prices, and potentially enable New Delhi to permit limited exports of wheat flour.
"Given the higher soil moisture at this time due to increased rainfall, wheat sowing and production are expected to surpass all previous record highs," Nitin Gupta, senior vice president at Olam Agri India, an agicultural commodity trader, told Reuters.
India's key wheat-growing north-western region was inundated with 161 per cent more rainfall than average in October, contributing to the country's overall 49 per cent surplus in the month.
Wheat was planted across 6.62 million hectares as of Nov. 14, up 17 per cent from a year earlier, according to data from the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers' Welfare.
Planting for the 2025/26 season is expected to rise about 5 per cent from last year's record 34.16 million hectares, based on an average estimate from eleven industry officials.