A better varietal mix and timely intervention on account of deficient rains may help Punjab to improve productivity of rice cultivation this kharif season. Productivity expect this kharif season would be more than that of last year, as farmers have sown high-yielding varieties over more area this time. As a result, even though the area under rice this season was less by over one lakh hectares, we expect a bumper yield. As per the current estimates, rice production during the 2017-18 kharif would be 18.1 MMTvs 18.9 MMT. Haryana is expecting a good paddy harvest. Even though the area under rice cultivation down by 26,000 hectares in 2017-18 kharif season vs LY, the yield is expected to fall only by 46,000 MT. In Punjab, the acreage under rice cultivation this season 2.93 MH 3.05 MH in LY. In Haryana, the area under rice shrank to 1.29 MH vs 1.31 MH in LY. Cotton and maize replaced rice in the remaining area.