The progress made during the last 3 years and the current
year has been considerably significant under various projects of the ministry.
Some of the major accomplishments are described below:
1.
Observation Systems: Recognizing the importance of
real-time data on meteorological and oceanographic data for various operational
weather and other advisory services, the Ministry has substantially augmented
the observations networks during the last 3 years. As a part of modernization
meteorological Services, Atmospheric Observing Systems has been strengthened through installation of 1500
state-of-the-art systems in various parts of the country for real-time
monitoring meteorological parameters which include 955 Automatic Rain gauges
and 552 Automatic weather stations in various parts of India. Ten Doppler
Weather Radars have been installed in various cities viz., Delhi airport, New
Delhi, Nagpur, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Lucknow,
Patna, Patiala, Agartala, Mohanbari,
Bhuj and Mumbai which has contributed for now
casting. The augmentation of Ocean
Observation Networks in the seas around India includes deployment of 19 moored
buoys including 10 Tsunami buoys, 150 Argo Floats, 55 drifters, 7 wave rider
buoys etc., for acquisition of real-time data from the seas around India.
2.
Services: Under the Meteorological Services, a
district-level agro-meteorological advisory service, providing a 5-day weather
forecast for farmers, in 585 districts, has been made operational. About 3,500,000 farmers have subscribed for
the information through mobile for planning their agricultural activities. A location-specific
weather and air quality forecast 24 hours in advance was provided successfully
for the Commonwealth Games 2010 in National Capital Region, Delhi. Under the
Ocean Science and Information Services,
a unique system of Fisheries Advisories based on identification of
potential fishing zones (PFZ) using remote sensing technology has been made
operational along with a new Tuna fishery advisory to deep sea fishing
industry. A Coral Bleaching Alert System (CABS) has been set up for providing bimonthly
status on 5 major coral environments of India viz., Andaman Nicobar,
Lakshadweep, Gulf of Mannar, Gulf
of Kutchchh.
Under Disaster Mitigation Support, a state-of-the-art Tsunami Warning
System was set up, in September 2007, which has been recognized as a Regional
Tsunami warning centre for the Indian Ocean countries which has been recognized
as a Regional Tsunami Service Provider (RTSP) for the Indian Ocean Region and
started operation to the Indian Ocean Rim countries. Under the framework of Regional Integrated
Multi-hazard Early warning System (RIMES), a data-sharing arrangement has been
established with the nine countries to provide 24 hour accumulated rainfall
forecast for 3 days. The countries
include Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Maldives,
Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. The departments of irrigation,
agriculture, and other primary users of weather information also have become
major beneficiaries.
3. Technology Development: Under the Ocean Technology & Resources,
two more LTTD plants were commissioned in the islands of Lakshadweep one each
at Minicoy and Agatti during March 2011 and August
2011, respectively. A full fledged hatchery unit for
the breeding and rearing of ornamental fishes was established at Agatti, Lakshadweep islands. The remotely operable submersible (ROSUB) was
tested at 5300 m in the Indian Ocean which is land mark achievement for
exploitation of resources. A Remotely
Operable Subsea In-situ Soil Tester (ROSIS) has been developed and was tested
at a water depth of 5462 m in the Central Indian Ocean Basin (CIOB). The maps of Coastal Vulnerability Index (CVI)
for the entire country was prepared
4. Scientific Research: Numerical weather prediction capability has
been significantly improved from 35 km to 22.5 km resolution. Tropical Cyclone
Tracker, which tracks and generates the cyclone positions in the forecasts
(& observations) has been implemented in the
Global Ensemble Forecast System (GEFS) and the T574L64. Under the Polar Science & cryosphere, the First Scientific expedition was
successfully undertaken to the South Pole in November 2010. In 2010, the fish
potential in the Indian EEZ was estimated using both satellite and in-situ
data, which was found to be 4.32 MSY
(maximum sustainable yield). India had made claim to the extended continental
shelf, in pursuant to Article 76 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of
the Sea (UNCLOS).
The monsoon mission was launched with multi-institutional
and inter-agency participation to improve the monsoon prediction over the
country on all time scales. A cloud
aerosol interaction precipitation experiments (CAIPEX) was carried using
instrumented aircraft measurements on campaign mode. Initiated
investigations on Deep Borehole (~7 Km) Observatory in Koyna-Warna
region for direct and continuous monitoring of intra-plate seismic zone at
depth, leading to a better understanding of the mechanics of faulting, physics
of reservoir triggered earthquakes as well as earthquake hazard assessment,
5.
Human Resources and Infrastructure Development:
Towards human resource development, an Advanced Training School was established
with self contained facilities for training and research at Pune.
The second batch of 20 students was inducted in August 2011 through a national
selective process. To process the huge volume of data and run the weather
forecasting models, the computation facilities have been substantially
augmented by commissioning of a set of 4 High Performance Computing systems in
various centres of the ministry which has a total combining capacity of 120 Tflops. The Third
Station in Antarctic in the Larsemann Hills area has
been completed. A dedicated centre for Climate Change Research was established
at Pune to address various scientific issues relating
to climate change. Setting up of National Knowledge Network (NKN) connection to
all the centres of MoES was accomplished for
efficient communication and data transfer useful for various information
services being rendered by the ministry. A dedicated Oceansat
Satellite Ground Station was installed at Indian National Centre for Ocean
Information Services (INCOIS), Hyderabad for real time direct reception of
satellite data for various operational Ocean Information Services
The progress of the ministry is satisfactory both in
quantitative and qualitative terms. The performance of the ministry has been
monitored objectively by the Performance Monitoring and Evaluation System
(PMES) of the Cabinet Secretariat. The Results-Framework Document submitted by
the ministry for the years 2010-11 and 2011-12, had been evaluated and the
performance were estimated to be 95.07% and 92.48% respectively. The efforts
made by the ministry towards augmentation of observational networks and
computation capability have lead to improved prediction of weather, and climate
services. According to a recent survey, various services such as agromet for farmers, potential fishing zone for fisherman,
ocean state forecast for shipping, aviation services, public weather services,
etc., have been extremely useful and beneficial for society at large.
The
above information was given by the Minister for Science & Technology and
Earth Sciences, Shri S. Jaipal
Reddy to the Parliament.
MC/sk