India Meteorological Department (IMD) and University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS), Dharwad,

Karnataka jointly organized ninth Annual Review Meeting of Gramin Krishi Mausam Sewa (GKMS) during

23-25 November 2015 at UAS, Dharwad. A number of high level dignitaries like Dr. D. P. Biradar,

Honorable Vice Chancellor, UAS, Dharwad, Dr. B. S. Janagoudar, Director of Research, UAS Dharwad,

Dr. V. U. M. Rao, Project Co-ordinator, AICRPAM, CRIDA, Hyderabad, Dr. K. K. Singh, Head, Agromet,

IMD, New Delhi and Dr. N. Chattopadhyay, DDGM (Agrimet), IMD, Pune, Scientists from other institutes,

Principal Nodal Officers, Nodal Officers and Technical Officers of Agrometeorological Field Units

(AMFUs), NGOs and private firms especially engaged in the dissemination of Agromet Advisories

participated in the meeting. The main objectives of this meeting was to review the effective implementation

of the GKMS scheme in respect of quality of agromet advisories, outreach and dissemination to the farmers,

capacity building at different levels, accuracy of medium range district level weather forecast etc. including

recent initiative on block level weather forecast and future activities of the project.

Annual Review meeting started with befitting manner after lighting of lamp by the dignitaries and opening

song by the students of the UAS, Dharwad. In the beginning of the inaugural function Dr. B.S. Janagoudar,

Director of Research, UAS, Dharwad welcomed all the delegates and explained about the history of the UAS,

Dharwad and the varieties and technologies developed by the scientists of UAS, Dharwad for the benefit of

the farmers and how the technologies are being adopted by the farmers in state of Karnataka. Dr. B.S.

Janagoudar also added that the forecasts issued by IMD have been immensely useful in planning for the

government and for the farmers throughout the crop season and good feedback has been received from

farmers on their adoption of weather forecasts for different agricultural management practices. According to

him, farmers in the state are not only looking for rainfall only but for other meteorological parameters and in

these days their expectations are relatively high in respect of weather forecast at different temporal scale and

also advance warning of extreme events.

Dr. N. Chattopadhyay, DDGM (Agrimet) briefly mentioned the significant achievements of the GKMS

project being implemented under collaborative mode with different organizations in the country. He also

elaborated the target and the activities to be performed in the next year to deliver more refined services to the

farmers in the country. He also mentioned about the proposed activities in regard to block level forecast and

advisories by involving the KVKs. He also informed that the services under GKMS are recognized not only

nationally but also internationally and efforts are being made by sharing the knowledge of AAS among the

SAARC countries to increase food production.

Dr. K. K. Singh, Head Agromet, IMD, New Delhi explained the brief genesis of Agromet Advisory

Services in India. He also explained about different existing weather observing system ranging from surface

to Doppler radar. He has made a special mention about the Rapid recently launched by the Satellite

Meteorology Division, IMD, New Delhi. Dr. Singh has also mentioned about different forecasting system

and their usability in Agromet Advisory Services. Elaboration of Monsoon Mission by MoES and other

sister organizations including IMD was also made by him. At the end he briefed about the ongoing and

proposed activities under GKMS in respect of preparation of agromet advisories, dissemination, feedback,

capacity building economic impact studies including experimentations of block level weather forecast and

advisories.

Dr. V.U.M. Rao, Project Co-coordinator, CRIDA expressed the pleasure to see the progress made by

GKMS project. He nicely described the genesis of Agromet Services in the country from the inception. He

said that the forecasting skills of medium range weather forecast have significantly improved and helped the

farmers to increase the crop production in the country. He also said about the economic impact study of

agromet services done by DST and other third party indicates the improvement of the services. According to

him more fine tuning of Agromet Advisories are needed to communicate the service to further lowest levels

i.e. block, village. He also added that these days’ farmers are requesting for valued technologies and climate

change information. He wished for healthy deliberations and success of the meeting.

Dr. D. P. Biradar, Hon’ble Vice Chancellor, UAS, Dharwad welcomed all the delegates from different

parts of the country. He expressed his happiness to know how the AAS has grown in the country from

nineties and providing value added services to the farmers in the country. According to him at present there

is great need for information on impact of weather on the crops and also for each and every agriculture

practice. He also has the opinion that in recent years there is substantial improvement of the Agromet

advisories. Looking to the importance and the demand of the services, he has shown optimism in opening

separate department of Agromet at PG level in the coming years in UAS Dharwad. He also elaborated the

very positive feedback from the farmers who are using the forecast and advisories for their agricultural

operations. He informed all those directly and indirectly involved that they should be very happy because

working in such a noble field which is helping the farmers. He also mentioned that still more understanding

is needed between agriculture scientists and people working in agromet as weather advice given to the

farmers is very much important. He also said that in addition to the rainfall information, relative humidity is

one of the parameter which is very much important for plant pathology and plant protection and scientist

must know that particular range of relative humidity which will ultimately impact on particular crop. He

requested all the participants to actively participate in the discussion during the course of the meeting so that

the ARM will become more meaningful.

After the inaugural address by the Chief Guest, best AMFU award for the dissemination of agromet

advisories to farmers was conferred to AMFU, Namakkal, Tamilnadu. Dr. Natarajan, Nodal Officer,

Namakkal was presented “Certificate of Excellence” in this regard by Dr. D. P. Biradar Honorable Vice

Chancellor, UAS, Dharwad. This is followed by the release of some publications prepared by UAS Dharwad

in presence of all the delegates and Chief Guest.

There were six sessions in the ARM programme. In the first session, seven presentations were made by the

domain experts regarding the various activities undergone under GKMS project and also two feedbacks from

the farmers of local regions. During the technical session II, there were four presentations followed by

discussion on issues identified on preparation of agromet advisories. In the third session, 6 presentations

were made by DDGMs from 6 RMCs and discussed about the performance of the district level weather

forecast. During the technical session IV, there were three presentations followed by discussion on issues

identified on dissemination of agromet advisories. During technical sessions V and VI, there were six

presentations followed by discussion on feedback collection, economic impact evaluation and capacity

building. In the final session four Working Groups namely quality of agromet advisories, advisories for new

sectors, dissemination of agromet advisories and popularization of AAS were formed. List of the members of

the four Working Groups is given in Annexure I. Each working group discussed among themselves for

preparation of road map and the work to be done during next one year for strengthening Agromet Advisory

Services in the country in terms of quality, dissemination, popularization and prepared the following

recommendations which are as follows:

Working Group I: Preparation and Quality of Agromet Advisories

DLWF Meetings: Recommendations of the DLWF meetings held at Kolkata and Thiruvanatapuram may

be taken into consideration. (Action: DDGM (Agrimet), Dr. K. Ghosh) 30 April 2016.

Regional High Resolution Model: Regional high resolution model for NE region needs to be set up for

getting better output. (Action: DDGM (NWP), Dr. G.C. Debnath DDGM, RMC Kolkata) 30 April

2016.

Gridded Rainfall Data: Presently we are using departmental observatories for district level observed

rainfall data verification but we don't have enough district level departmental observatories.

For example MC Jaipur has 33 districts, out of which observed rainfall value is available only for 11

districts so the verification is restricted to these districts. To overcome this issue, instead of using direct

observations, we can create rainfall data from 0.25 degree gridded rainfall data product of National

Climate Centre. The same district level mask file used by NWP division can be utilized for generating

the rainfall data series. Similar data can be made available for max and min temp. (Action: DDGM

(Agrimet), DDGM (NCC), Dr. K. Ghosh and Dr. O.P. Sreejit) 30 April 2016.

Refinement of MME model: Refinement of MME model is required as presently MME is having inputs

only from GFS model. There is a need to incorporate the NWP models like ECMWF, UKMET, GFS

Model with the latest data assimilation schemes and higher model resolution. This may be adopted by 30

April 2016. (ACTION: DDGM (NWP), DDGM (Agrimet), DDGM RMC ND, Group Captain R. Vishen)

30 April 2016).

Online verification of AAU forecast: Software for online verification of forecast needs to be integrated in

KISAN Portal for those districts having representative observatories for day to day verification. The

inputs will be restricted only for the respective forecasters carrying out value addition and will not be

available to other agencies. DDGM (Agrimet) will coordinate for the same with Ministry of Agriculture

and NIC. (Action: DDGM (Agrimet), Dr. K. Ghosh) 30 April 2016.

Synoptic observations by Agromet Observatories: There is a need to record additional observations at 03

UTC and 12 UTC along-with regular observations from Agromet observatories at AMFUs and to

transmit these observations to GTS on real time basis for their assimilation into model by 31 May 2016.

DDGM (Ag) will coordinate for the same with NIC, Pune. (Action: DDGM (Agrimet), Dr. K. Ghosh).

Crop atlas and crop calendars: Crop atlas and crop calendars at district level are needed to be made

available to AMFUs and MCs. The data from these documents are needed to be uploaded within 6

months and to be digitized before next ARM. (Action: Dr. K. Ghosh for crop Calendar for DDGM

(Agrimet), Pune, Prof. Vyas Pandey, AAU for Crop atlas from AICRP, Dr. G. Sreenivas).

Impact Studies: Each AMFU needs to compile the impact on crops based on sensitivity data extracted

from the studies carried out at respective centres along with advisories and upload in KISAN Portal.

DDGM (Agrimet) will send a letter to Director of Research / Director of respective universities /

Institutes for the same. (Action: DDGM (Agrimet) and Dr. G. Sreenivas, Dr. KK Gill) (31 May 2016).

Advisories for New sectors: Advisories for new sectors like animals, poultry, fisheries etc. may be started

by AMFUs. Respective AMFU will ensure from the align departments available in the region regarding

sensitivity data along-with advisories and upload in the website. Experts from the National Institutes may

also be contacted by DDGM (Agrimet) for the source of sensitivity data. A letter from DDGM (Ag) will

be sent to the Head of each Institute for coordination upto grass root level (Action: DDGM (Agrimet) Dr.

R.S. Rana, AMFU Palampur and Dr. G. Sreenivas, Hyderabad to liaise and monitor) (31 May 2016).

District specific database: There is need to prepare district specific database in farmer’s Portal. (Action:

DDGM (Agrimet), NIC, New Delhi, Dr. A. Vashisth, IARI, Dr. Gill, PAU, Ludhiana) (31 December

2015).

Real time uploading of Advisories: Issues related to real time uploading of district level Agromet

advisories in Agrimet website may be resolved. DDGM (Agrimet) will coordinate for the same with NIC,

Pune. (Action: Dr. S. Mishra, AMFU, Faridkot to liase and monitor) (31 December 2015).

Use of Decision support System and CRM tools for preparation of advisories under different weather

scenarios. (Head (Agromet), DDGM (Ag), AMFUs).

Crop Component Information: Crop component information as tabulated may be included to improve the

quality of Agromet advisories.

Working Group II: Dissemination and popularization of Agromet Advisories

Each AMFU will list out Local TV channel, Radio Stations including FM/Community radios, News

papers, KVKs, Govt. Agri Extension Offices, Development officials, Natural Disaster Unit, Gram

Panchayats, NGO, FPO/Clubs, mobile operators, input dealers etc. for regular dispatch of agromet

advisories. E-mail IDs, telephone/mobile No./address of the point of contact with each agency should

also be maintained. Feedback on how the bulletin is used should also be collected from the farmers.

Priority should be given to SMS and IVRS.(Action: AMFUs)

Coverage/circulation/subscription/membership of each medium should also be ascertained for

assessing the reach of agromet advisories to the target group. (Action: AMFUs)

Agromet advisories should be disseminated in farmer friendly regional language for better

understanding by the end user i.e. farmers in time. It is recommended that content of agro-advisories

should be scripted and provided as text and audio file to the disseminators so as the content do not get

distorted by the disseminator. (Action: AMFUs)

DD Kisan and other channels should schedule with different time slots advisories for different States.

TV spots on weather based agro-advisories should be made granular and interactive. After the

bulletin presentation phone in programme should be introduced to handle farmer’s queries on current

weather and advisories. (Action: DDGM (Agrimet)

National, State and AMFU level meeting with agro advisories disseminators should be made

mandatory for taking any policy decision on dissemination. (Action: AMFUs/SAMCs/DDGM

(Agrimet))

Farmers portal should have provision of uploading of data for all the districts. Procedure of obtaining

customised delivery of agromet advisories should be simplified. Registration of farmers should be

made simple and location wise. Classified information on registrations should be available for

collecting proper feedback. Facility for withdrawal of registration should also be available if it is not

there. (Action: AMFUs/DDGM (Agrimet))

AMFUs and all the disseminators should also popularise Agrimet Website for a ready to use

reference of agro-advisories. (Action: AMFUs)

Review of content at timely interval. Sensitization workshop/training for disseminators should be

organized periodically. (Action: AMFUs/SAMCs/DDGM (Agrimet))

These may be implemented as soon as possible and all modes of dissemination should be explored by

30th

May 2016.

Working Group III: Feedback and economic Assessment

Event based feedback for the crops in each season are required. (Action-AMFUs)

Creation of Mobile Social Groups with Line Department officials and identification of progressive

farmers (through FAP) across the AC Zone. (Action: AMFUs)

Facility for online feedback system. For this, there is a need of approval and funding from IMD.

(Action: AMFUs, IMD, New Delhi)

Conduct at least one Farmer Awareness Programs at station annually for taking feedback. (Action:

AMFUs)

Conduct two on-farm visits/year with experts to facilitate awareness, feedback, and economic impact

and also to strengthen the relationship. (Action: AMFUs)

Formation of two Farmers’ Group at Block Level by AMFUs, Training to them, Periodical

Assessment of Economics for advisories (feedback can also be generated from this group) – Selection

to be done as per norms. A third party agency to be involved. (Action: AMFUs and IMD).

A standard format (SOP) for economic assessment (region-wise, crop-wise, area-wise-flexible to all)

to be circulated. (Action: IMD and AMFUs)

One or two Field Days may be conducted on the success of advisory from the contingent funding.

(Action: IMD, New Delhi and AMFU)

This may be implemented as soon as possible and work should be start at the earliest.

Working Group IV: Training and Capacity building

Capacity building for IMD personnel, KVK- Subject matter specialists, AMFU personnel, Farmers,

Other stake holder’s levels should be done. (Action: IMD, AMFUs).

Specialized training for weather forecasters should be conducted for exposure to latest technology in

Agrimet and regarding forecasting techniques, analysis and value addition.(Action: IMD, New Delhi)

Refresher course should be conducted in every two years at Agrimet division Pune for AMFU

personnel. (Action: IMD, Pune).

Familiarization with meteorological products is needed. (Action: IMD New Delhi and Pune).

Continuous training in crop simulation modeling and its adoption in development of AABs and

development of pest & disease forewarning models. Action: IMD New Delhi and Pune).

This may be implemented as soon as possible and work should be start at the earliest.

VIIth

session was held on Wednesday 25 November 2015. Different working group leaders have presented

their recommendations on different themes. This was focused on how it will be more useful to end users for

strengthening agromet advisories services in the country. After the presentations by each group leaders,

panel discussion was held among the panel of Dr. K.K. Singh, Head Agromet, Dr. N. Chattopdhyay and Dr.

H. Venkatesh, Principle Organising Secretory of ARM to finalize the deliberations of different working

groups /recommendations of the ARM and prepare road map for future activities of GKMS. It has also been

suggested that all the AMFUs should sent UC/SE/APR and demand by April end for scrutiny for

quicker processing by IMD.

At the end Dr. H. Venkatesh, Principle Organising Secretory of ARM and Nodal officer, Dr. U.K. Hulihalli

proposed vote of thanks.

Annexure-I List of the members of the four Working Groups

I. Working Group I:Preparation and Quality of Agromet Advisories

1. Dr. Anand Sharma (Leader)

2. Dr. R. S. Rana

3. Dr. G. Srinivas

4. Dr. Vyas Pandey

5. Dr. Anantha Vasisth

6. Dr. G. C. Debnath

7. Dr. K. K. Gill

8. Group Captain.R. Vishen

9. Dr. K. Ghosh

II. Working Group II: Dissemination and popularization of Agromet Advisories

10. Dr. G. C. Shrotriya (Leader)

11. Shri Ashish Bhatnagar

12. Dr. Sanjib Bandopadhyay

13. Dr. S. Pashupalak

14. Shri. Balasubramanian

15. Ms. Rehena Habib

16. Ms. Rucha Dave

17. Shri. G. N. Raha

III. Working Group III: Feedback and economic Assessment

18. Dr. Natarajan (Leader)

19. Dr. Subhendu Banodyopadhyay

20. Dr. M. L. Sahu

21. Dr. K. Santosh

22. Dr. P. Baweja

23. Dr. Pralhad Jaybhaye

24. Dr. M. L. Khichar

25. Dr. A. Venkatashan

IV. Working Group IV:Training and Capacity building

26. Dr. H. Venkatesh (Leader)

27. Dr. D. Saha

28. Shri K. S. Hosalikar,

29. Dr. T. Prathima

30. Dr. S. Wanjari

31. Dr. S. B. Thampi

32. Dr. Sion Banerjee

33. Dr. Rani Saxena

34. Shri. A. K. Baxla

35. Dr. Jayant Sarkar

36. Dr. S. B. Kharabade