India hopes for a good and fruitful monsoon this year

Deepak Kumar Mohanty

New Delhi

Mon, 21 Apr 2008: 

India, where the economy depends more on agricultural productivity with over 60 percent of population depending on agriculture for livelihood despite modern technology, the monsoon has been one of important phenomenon to watch out for. A bad or good monsoon largely affects Government decission makingrocess in many ways as it also has impact on industrial output in terms of demand supply ratio.

As per the forecast of Indian Meteorological Department, India is hoping for a normal and productive monsoon this year which has given some cheer to farmers over the rising price rise of essential commodities. The IMD Pune lately has in a press release expected a near-normal south-west monsoon (June-September) by using both "statistical" and "dynamic" models.

Monsoon becomes an important phenomenon in the lack of suitable irrigation facilities in most parts of the country where direct rainfall is great means for farmer to sow rice, wheat, lentils to meet common diets of Indians and also the over all food stock for rest of the year.

Considering the low global stock of food grains, increasing food price and rocketing inflation in India, a below average agricultural output can further weaken industrial growth, decrease agricultural export, increase fiscal deficit, harden interest rates, lower investment and above all will add more pressure to the already high 7 percent inflation.

At present with less food stock globally and high food prices it would be wrong to undermine Indian agriculture being a less contributor to gross domestic product. Moreover India is one of the largest producers of grains such as rice and wheat; any adverseness in agricultural productivity would add more vulnerability to the needs of other parts of the world as well.

Talking about domestic needs the population rise and increasing expenditure on food to crop up the overall need of food production. So, if monsoon affects agriculture then India has to import food which would have larger impact on global market with rising prices.

As in common case it is noticed that rising import forces traders to stock items thereby increasing prices which certainly have adverse impact on the poors. Hence a good monsoon always enables government to control the domestic market. But it all depends on the monsoon and not merely the forecast though this time the Met deptt is said to have used some additional calculations to generate a near accurate rain forecast.

Let’s hope for a good and fruitful monsoon this year.