Date:28/06/2009 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2009/06/28/stories/2009062856460600.htm

Karnataka

48-hour weather forecast soon

Special Correspondent

500 additional automatic weather stations will be set up

— Photo: K. Gopinathan

FOR CONSERVATION: ISRO Chairman G. Madhavan Nair (right) presenting ‘Bhu Ratna Award’ to T.K.A. Nair, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, at a function in Bangalore on Saturday.

BANGALORE: In about a year from now, India will be in a position to undertake accurate weather forecasting for the next 48 hours.

Disclosing this at the valedictory of a three-day national conference on “challenges and opportunities for bio-industrial watershed development for the prosperity of farming community” organised by the Soil Conservation Society of India in Bangalore on Saturday, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman Madhavan Nair said at present the country could take up accurate forecasting only for six hours.

Although it was possible to forecast for 48 hours at present, the chance of success was only 60 per cent. ISRO was working with the Indian Meteorological Department and other agencies to evolve a system which can assure 90 per cent success in forecasting for 48 hours, he said.

The country’s weather forecasting system would achieve international standards if it manages to put in place a system of accurate forecasting for 48 hours, he said. This would be achieved by putting an additional 500 automatic weather stations to the existing 500 such weather stations and increasing the number of radars.

Such an advanced forecast would be of help particularly to farmers as details on issues related to farming such as soil moisture, precipitation and cloud movement would be known among other things.

Prime Minister’s Principal Secretary T.K A. Nair called for carefully examining environmental aspects before finalising any development project. The tendency to ignore environmental aspects had led to environmental degradation which affected poor people the most, he said.

Meanwhile, the workshop recommended to the Union Government to replicate the State’s model of forming an exclusive Department of Watershed besides forming a Central Watershed Management Commission.

The other recommendations include steps needed to bring about coordination among the Union Ministries of Rural Development and Panchayat Raj, Agriculture, Food Processing, Water Resources and Forest, Environment and Ecology.Watershed Development Department Commissioner K.H. Gopalakrishne Gowda and SCSI president Suraj Bhan, SCSI Patron J.S. Bali, and SCSI State unit president G. Praksh were present.