India's Monsoon to Hit Kerala Coast on May 30
Date: 16-May-06
Country: INDIA
Author: Hari Ramachandran
"The monsoon will onset over the Kerala coast on May 30," M. Rajeevan, a senior official at the India Meteorological Department told Reuters.
The annual southwest monsoon is key to the economic health of India's US$700-billion economy, with the farm sector generating more than a fifth of the country's gross domestic product.
With nearly two-thirds of the billion-plus population earning income from agriculture, the timely arrival and even distribution of the annual rains play a major role in determining eventual demand in the wider economy.
"The onset forecast model suggests that the monsoon onset over Kerala is likely to be on May 30 with a forecast error of three days," the department said in a statement.
In the last 50 years, the earliest the rains have made landfall in Kerala was on May 14 in 1960, while the latest was on June 18 in 1972.
The four-month monsoon usually arrives over the commercial capital of Mumbai by June 10, and brings respite from the summmer heat in the capital, New Delhi, by June 29. Most years it covers the entire country by July 15.
Weather officials in April forecast this year's rains at 93 percent of the long-term average, with a 22 percent probability of being deficient.
That "just below normal" prediction failed to rattle markets and most analysts said they still expected Asia's third-largest economy to grow between 7.5 and 8.0 percent in 2006/07.
Rajeevan said the department stood by its earlier statement. "Conditions have become favourable for onset of the southwest monsoon over the southeast Bay of Bengal and Nicobar Islands around May 18 or 19, near its normal date," he said.
Most of India's farms are dependent on rain in the absence of modern irrigation facilities. The monsoons begin around June 1 in Kerala before spreading across the vast South Asian country over a four-month period.
Another weather department official said there had been wide pre-monsoon showers in coastal areas of southern Andhra Pradesh state, Karnataka and eastern Orissa.
Analysts said financial markets were not overly concerned over predictions of a slightly weaker than average monsoon.
"What matters is the distribution of rainfall and not the small percentage of deficit or the date of the onset of monsoon," said a Mumbai-based analyst.
In 2002, a severe drought hit many parts of the country, lowering agricultural production. India witnessed its best monsoon in more than a decade in 2003, helping the country to reap bumper grain and oilseed harvests and lifting economic growth.
In 2005, the monsoon boosted farm output, helping the economy expand by 8.1 percent in the year to March 2006.