Keeping in mind the frequent changes in weather in India and the world, including significant changes in the rain patterns every monsoon in India, a new crop insurance scheme has been implemented in all the 13 blocks in Pudukottai district in Tamil Nadu.
Under the scheme, weather-based crop insurance and coconut palm insurance schemes are implemented at village levels for losses suffered due to nature’s fury.
However, Tamil Nadu’s chief minister Jayalalithaa flayed the Centre for replacing the National Agriculture Insurance Scheme with Modified National Agriculture Insurance Scheme/Weather Based Crop Insurance Scheme (WBCIS) without consulting state government. Jaya feels that by implementing the new insurance scheme from the 2013-14 rabi season, the government may only add to the farmers' burden.
And to save the farmers from paying the insurance sum the Centre and state government should bear the burden of over 2% of the sum insured under the National Crop Insurance Programme.
In a recent report by the Parliament of India, more than 24 lakh farmers benefited from crop insurance schemes in year 2012-13, with farmers from Maharashtra benefiting the highest (up to 13.18 lakh), followed by Tamil Nadu and Karnataka with crop insurance schemes of 6.91 lakh and 2.74 lakh respectively.
Recently, President Obama had expressed concern over climate change in the U.S which is already having a negative impact on agriculture and forestry. The Obama administration announced the creation of new regional ‘hubs’ to help farmers adapt to changing climate, something farmers never had to deal with.
Accurate weather predictions by Skymet Weather helps various banks and agro companies in calculating and analyzing their losses and deciding their crop insurance norms and policies, especially during the season of monsoon in India. Skymet Weather has already predicted the situation of monsoon in India this year in the Monsoon Foreshadow 2014.
