Flood-hit India boosts monsoon tracking skills

(30 Aug. 2006): -India is strengthening its skills to predict annual monsoon rains that spell the
difference between riches and ruin for its farmers, but says 2010 is the earliest
it will be able to advise them when to grow crops. India's four-month monsoon
season , plays a crucial role in determining rural incomes and consumer spending
for a wide range of goods, as about two-thirds of a population of more than one
billion live off the land. Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal said India
was investing 215 million dollars in the first phase of plans to improve weather
prediction that includes upgrading weather forecasting equipment across the country.
Sibal made the remarks in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, where he attended
a meeting of ministers of the ten-member Associations of Southeast Asian Nations.
Devastating floods across five states this year, have already hurt Indian industrial and
agricultural output. Swollen rivers swamped thousands of villages and towns in
parts of the south and the industrialised west, forcing 4.5million people from their
homes and halting output at a major gas plant serving northern power stations.
In the desert state of Rajasthan, the heaviest rains in at least three decades ,triggered
flooding last week that killed almost 140 people and displaced thousands from their homes.