A month of truant rain
We now have rain data for four complete weeks from the India Meteorological Department (IMD) and for all the districts that have reported the progress of the monsoon. The overall picture is even more serious than reported earlier because of the falling levels of water in the country’s major reservoirs. [05 to 11 June is the first week. 12 to 18 June is the second week. 19 to 25 June is the third week. 26 June to 02 July is the fourth week.]
Using the new measure of assessing the adequacy of district rainfall (and not the meteorological cgradations that is the IMD standard), in the fourth week of the monsoon the number of districts that reported normal rains in that week (+5% to -5%) is 18; deficient 1 (-6% to -20%) is 31; deficient 2 (-21% and more) is 437; excess 1 (+6% to +20%) is 17; excess 2 (+21% and more) is 113; no data was reported from 25.
[…] In the fifth week of the South-West monsoon, the trend continues to be that week by week, the number of districts which have recorded less rainfall than they normally receive outnumber those…. When this happens over a prolonged period, such as four to six weeks, drought-like conditions set […]
Quiet preparations for scarce water, smaller harvests | Resources Research
July 18, 2014 at 12:00