Argentina's farmers will reduce the country's maize planting area for the 2014/15 season by 16 percent compared with the previous season as high inflation fuels production costs. Farmers in the world's No. 3 supplier of corn would sow 3.7 million hectares (9.1 million acres) of corn, down 700,000 from the 2013/14 season.
Higher demand pushed up castor seed prices in the Rajkot spot market of Gujarat state. Moreover, speculative buying at the lower level also supported the rise in castor price in the Indian futures market. According to the traders, expectation of export demand for castor oil encouraged the mills to buy more castor seed.
Colombia produced 1.24 million 60 kg bags of arabica coffee in July, the highest coffee output for that month in 16 years. This year coffee output stood at 11.7 million bags, the highest in six years, underscoring the rebound in Colombia's production after a run of poor harvests due to bad weather and spread of the fungal disease roya.
Even as central and state government attempts to solve the problem of acute shortage of coal for thermal projects in Uttar Pradesh, woes of people do not seem to end as power crisis deepens in Uttar Pradesh owing to a weak monsoon and shortage of adequate power supply.
Weather plays a crucial role in determining the demand and supply of power. Due to an inclement weather owing to a poor monsoon, the demand of power in U.P. has increased over past few months.
It has been a poor monsoon for the country and it remained equally bad for U.P. While in July, the east U.P. witnessed a rain deficiency of 25% and west U.P. witnessed a rain deficiency of 41%, it worsened in August leading to a rain deficiency of 53% in east U.P. and 72% in west U.P.
The weak monsoon also led to many dry days in U.P. The capital city of Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, only witnessed 57.4 mm of rain in last ten days. Bareilly mainly remained dry during the same span. For Gorakhpur the rain was 24 mm in last ten days where only one day received rain of 21 mm, leaving rest of the days highly dry.
So even though the state observed sporadic rain in this monsoon season, most of the days were highly hot and dry. The situation has worsened due to the prolonged dry spell.
According to Skymet Meteorology Division of India, the state can expect light rain showers in the next few days. The cloud cover over the state is anticipated to bring some respite from the hot weather leading to a decline in the current power demand.
Monsoon season in India started on a poor note this year, with country witnessing a deficit of 43 per cent for June, the onset month of the monsoon. However, the situation improved in July, reducing the cumulative deficit for the country to 22 per cent. Similar weather conditions were observed in August that ended up with the cumulative deficiency of 17 per cent. Meanwhile in September so far, the first 10 days of the month have witnessed above normal rains, resulting in further dip in deficiency to 11 per cent.
Monsoon in India could be conceived as a complex phenomenon, inherited with a variety of phases ranging from active Monsoon to weak, lull, break and the like. Monsoon experiences a lot of variation and not uniform throughout the season. Some pockets of country has received normal rainfall, some experienced excess and some pockets continue to be in deficit.
India is divided into four meteorological regions--East and Northeast India, Northwest India, Central India and South Peninsula. Even though the country did not witness the sufficient rainfall, some of the sub-divisions of these regions have managed to get the decent rainfall. Following are the four rainiest sub-divisions in each meteorological region that have received the highest rain spell so far.
Uttarakhand: The hilly state that falls in the northwest region of the country has received 847.3 mm of rainfall till now against the normal of 1108.1 mm, resulting in the deficit of 24 per cent. The state has witnessed heavy rainfall, due to which the famous holy pilgrimage of Kedarnath was also suspended for few days. Last year also, the incessant rainfall had created havoc in the region, where thousands of people had died.
Sub-Himalayan West Bengal and Sikkim: This is one of the smallest meteorological sub-division under the East and Northeast region. The division includes the hilly terrain of Sikkim and the foothills of West Bengal and is known for heavy monsoon showers, even during the break monsoon period. So far, the sub-division has observed 1556.2 mm rainfall against the normal of 1725.9 mm. Thus, the region has received normal rainfall with the cumulative deficit of 10 per cent till now.
Konkan and Goa: The sub-division forms part of the Central India region. The entire Western Ghats are famous for incessant rainfall during the monsoon season, owing to its orographic barriers with the height of mountains varying from 5000 ft to 7000 ft. It has observed 2609.8 mm of rainfall against the normal of 2889.9 mm so far, with the cumulative deficit of 4% indicating towards normal rainfall. This pocket receives rains everyday during the monsoon and it is very rare that this region do not witness any showers.
Coastal Karnataka: Falling in South Peninsula region, this sub-division is the rainiest of all the above. The state of Karnataka is divided into three parts South Interior Karnataka, North Interior Karnataka and Coastal Karnataka. This pocket has observed 2973.5 mm of rainfall against the normal of 2889.9 mm, with the surplus by 3% so far. Some of the regions of this pocket have even experienced monthly normal of four digits, even though it had started with a deficit initially but accounting to the heavy rainfall and ongoing monsoon the pocket recovered soon.
According to Skymet Meteorology Division in India, it is unlikely for Uttarakhand region to cover up the deficit, as the monsoon is set to withdraw during the third week of September. While the other three sub-divisions will continue to observe good rainfall during September and the first half of October.
The four month long Monsoon season over the Indian region spanning from June to September, with a Long Period Average (LPA) of 89 cm of rain for this period, is conceived as a complex phenomenon.
Southwest Monsoon, after ushering in made a sluggish start with subdued activity in the initial phase and made a very slow advancement. After poor Monsoon rains in June, July too commenced with a 43% deficit – highest for the season - and remained so till 12th July. The month ended with a cumulative deficiency of 22% while at present rain deficit stands at 11%.
July and August are generally the active Monsoon months for the entire country. June is the onset month which witnesses an outburst of rain while, September is the withdrawal month, receiving more of sporadic rain.
Withdrawal is generally not attempted before 1st of September and commences from extreme west Rajasthan. As Southwest Monsoon approaches the withdrawal phase from a particular region, certain conditions become prevalent- change of wind pattern, reduction in cloud cover, decrease in humidity, cessation of rain and temporary rising tendency of temperatures.
North India
The present Monsoon system over Central India, unlike the previous one, took a north/northeastward turn from Gujarat and south Rajasthan. The system, after bringing good showers over Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and south Rajasthan, re-curved to bring rain over northwest Madhya Pradesh and adjoining Uttar Pradesh.
The track of the system will dictate the withdrawal of Monsoon and cessation of rain from Northwest India. In the months of October and November, North India will mostly witness clear sky with least amounts of rainfall. Only the Western Disturbance could bring some rain, if at all.
According to latest weather update by Skymet Meteorology Division in India, this year, Southwest Monsoon is likely to withdraw from west Rajasthan anytime in the coming week.
Central India
In 2013, withdrawal of Southwest Monsoon was delayed from Central India as well. This time, Monsoon may withdraw in quick succession from Central region after bidding farewell from Northern parts.
East and Northeast India
This part of the country receives rain for the entire month of September and at least for the first 10 days of October. The normal date for the withdrawal of Monsoon from East and Northeast is 10th of October.
South India
Southern parts of the country enjoy the complete four month duration of Monsoon. The retreat of Southwest Monsoon coincides with the onset of Northeast Monsoon. The wind pattern will change from south westerly to north easterly. Therefore, Tamil Nadu and adjoining areas of coastal Andhra Pradesh will witness the rainiest period during the retreat of Monsoon.
Every year, some features of onset and withdrawal of Southwest Monsoon remains inexplicable and leaves behind a lot of questions unanswered. In fact, no two patterns of onset and withdrawal are similar. Last year withdrawal began quite late around 18th September from west Rajasthan, against the normal date of 1st September. Monsoon generally bids farewell from Delhi/NCR and other northern plains by 3rd week of September but was delayed till about 16th October.
The first week of September has been extremely important for the country in terms of Monsoon rain. Heavy showers during this period have helped in pulling down the national cumulative deficit to a large extent. But the threat of a drought still remains as June and July had left behind a huge deficit.
Rainfall during August
After Monsoon performed extremely poorly during these two months, some improvement was observed in August. The first week of the month received fairly good rain and the national cumulative deficit during this period came down to 18% from 23%. However, it stagnated after that and kept oscillating between 17% and 18% for the entire month.
Rainfall during September
September started on a very good note with the first 9 days of the month observing above normal rainfall. On the 5th of September there was 18.6 mm of rain against the daily average of 6.8 mm, which means it was triple the amount. Similarly, 13 mm of rain was observed on 4th September against the daily average of 7 mm.
This spell of very good rain has pulled down the deficit to 11% from 18%. During these nine days, the country has already received 103 mm of rain against the monthly average of 173 mm, which is about 2/3rd of the monthly rainfall.
But now the rainfall belt will shrink and the amount will reduce. Pockets of significant rain are going to be isolated and few due to which the national deficit is likely to get arrested or may increase marginally.
It’s also the time for the Southwest Monsoon to commence withdrawal from some parts of the country - starting with west Rajasthan - and gradually cover parts of North and Central India. Following this activity these areas will observe minimal rainfall.
Britain's wheat crop is on track to be its highest in at least six years, ensuring the country's return as a net exporter after a two season hiatus, but selling its surplus could prove challenging given an expected global glut of feed grain. Britain predominantly exports feed quality wheat to customers within the European Union.
India's state-run trader MMTC Ltd floated a tender recently to import 10,000 tonnes of rice for delivery in the north eastern state Mizoram. India is the world's second biggest rice producing country, has huge surplus stocks. Imports are sometimes required because of poor transportation links to ship grain to interior areas in northeast India.
Brazil will likely produce a record 95.1 million tonnes of soybeans in the 2014-2015 crop year that will begin planting later this month, local consultancy Agroconsult said, up from its previous estimate of 94 million tonnes in May 2014. Agroconsult expects neighboring Argentina to produce 56.6 million tonnes of soybean.
Black pepper prices at Kochi market ruled steady as both the spot and primary markets were by and large closed on account of week-long Onam festival. The spot market remained steady at Rs 68,700 (ungarbled) and Rs 71,700 (garbled) per quintal. No trading took place at market. No activities were reported from the national exchange.
September 2014, more than 100 people were dead while thousands were left stranded in flood stricken Jammu & Kashmir.
In June 2013, flash floods marred the Alaknanda, Bhagirathi, Mandakini, Gori Ganga, Pindar, and Kali rivers. According to official data, 4,190 people died in the disaster, more than 2,500 buildings were completely destroyed, and 2,070 roads and 145 bridges were damaged.
In 2012, a landslide in Ukhimath and flash floods in the Assi Ganga and the Bhagirathi rivers killed about a 100 people and caused extensive damage to livestock and property.
Since the 2004 tsunami killed more than 10,000 in India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu, India has been trying to upgrade its disaster management systems but no results have been seen so far.
Even after so many costly wake-up calls and cities that have been left in shambles, proper weather monitoring equipment is missing in Indian coastal and hilly states. What is perhaps lacking in these states is an effective disaster monitoring, warning and management system.
Indian hilly states of Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and J&K are highly vulnerable to flash floods caused by heavy rains, cloudbursts and avalanches. The difficult terrain too makes the building and operation of big hydroelectric schemes tough. But is it impossible?
People living near coastal lines or villages in hilly regions are often the first ones to be hit in these natural disasters and lack of timely warning to these people even aggravate things further. But maybe a possible installment of weather forecasting technologies, radars and other equipment can improve the current condition to some extent.
After the catastrophe in Uttrakhand, central government approved a project for installing state-of-the-art automatic weather station and radar in the state. Under the project, Indian Meteorological Department also announced to install three dopplar radars. But the announcements have just remained announcements so far and have not seen the light of the day.
India is an intensive agrarian country where farmers largely depend on monsoon rain for their harvest. Due to lack of accurate or absolute absence of rain and weather related information; it has often led to farmers’ suicide in many parts of India including Vidharbha in Maharashtra, Punjab and Haryana.
Clearly, weather forecasting methods in India are under a dire need of an upgrade. What is required is perhaps improved planning and execution to enhance the quality of weather related information, crucial for farmers and public in general.
Though the government has announced a state-of-the-art automatic weather station in Uttarakhand, similar systems are required in the state of Himachal Pradesh and J&K that are equally exposed to the frequent occurrence of natural disasters. Timely weather alerts may not stop the occurrence of these disaster but can possibly avert such calamities in future.
