Monsoon Rains Forecast To Be Average In 2021: Weather Office

The monsoon delivers nearly 70 per cent of rains that India needs to water farms and recharge reservoirs and aquifers.

India is likely to receive an average amount of rain in the 2021 monsoon, the state-run weather office said on Friday, raising expectations of higher farm and economic growth in Asia's third-biggest economy, which is reeling from a surge in coronavirus cases. Monsoon rainfall is expected to total 98 per cent of the long-term average, M. Rajeevan, secretary at the Ministry of Earth Sciences, told a virtual news conference. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) defines average, or normal, rainfall as between 96 per cent and 104 per cent of a 50-year average of 88 cm (34 inches) for the entire four-month season beginning June. In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, agriculture has been a bright spot in India's economy, and a good monsoon would help the sector and the countryside, said Radhika Rao, economist at DBS Bank in Singapore.