New Delhi, Nov 3 (IANS) India's rice output is expected to be around 69.45 million tonnes this kharif season, or about 15 million tonnes less than in the previous season, according to the government's first advanced estimates for foodgrain production released Tuesday.

During the 2008-09 kharif season, rice production stood at 84.

5 million tonnes.

The first advance estimates of production of major crops grown in the country during the kharif season gains significance as the summer crops, mainly paddy, have been hit by drought.

Earlier Tuesday, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee acknowledged as much, saying that the erratic monsoon this year, followed by floods in some parts of the country, could have lowered India's foodgrain output by some 14-15 million tonnes.

'I'm waiting for a hard assessment of the sub-normal southwest monsoon and the impact of floods in some parts of the country,' the finance minister said at the annual Economic Editors' Conference.

'There are some estimates that grain production will be less -- 14-15 million tonnes. But we will have to wait for the inputs,' he said during the interactive session.

India had logged record foodgrain output in 2008-09 (July-June), estimated at 233.87 million tonnes. But the failure of monsoon -- on which depends 60 percent of India's agriculture -- has cast a shadow on this year's crop.

The latest estimates put the total kharif foodgrain output at 96.63 million tonnes.

Of this, coarse cereals accounted for 22.76 million tonnes, maize 12.61 million tonnes, jowar 2.55 million tonnes, bajra 5.83 million tonnes, kharif pulses 4.42 million tonnes, tur or arhar 2.47 million tonnes, urad 0.88 million tonnes, and moong 0.52 million tonnes.

The estimates were earlier expected to have been released in September, but the process was deferred on account of the drought in several parts of the country.

'The estimate is delayed as drought-affected states have not been able to provide figures in time,' Agriculture Secretary T. Nanda Kumar had said then.

The government releases four advance estimates of farm production across the year apart from making a final projection.