SCIENCE

There is no decline in rainfall during 2011 so far in the country. The country received 716.0mm rain as a whole monsoon rainfall till 31st August 2011 is marginally higher than the seasonal quantum of 713.4mm.

Although, the rainfall quantum received for the country as a whole during the period 1st June – 10th August, 2011 was -4%, the decline was made up fully by the end of August 2011, due to the prevalence of active monsoon rainfall conditions.

Continuous R & D efforts are made to understand spatial and temporal variability of monsoon rainfall.

Due to the year-to-year variability and the associated within the season variability of monsoon rainfall, the areas of excess and deficient rainfall vary from year to year. Department has Launched a high-priority Programme to address the Science issues of Global and Regional Climate Change with a well equipped state-of-the-art Center for Climate Change Research (CCCR) at Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune for inter-disciplinary research and training in the area of science of climate change. Prioritized R & D efforts are initiated to comprehensively understand the causes for the aforementioned changes in the southwest monsoon rainfall and to improve the rainfall predictions in all time scales.

This information was given by the Minister of State in the Ministry of Science and Technology and Earth Sciences Shri Ashwani Kumar in a written reply to a question by Shri Nand Kumar Sai in Rajya Sabha.