By IANS
New Delhi : Finance Minister P. Chidambaram Friday asked meteorologists to give an accurate monsoon forecast to help farmers in sowing crops.
"Agriculture production in India is largely dependent on monsoon and we must do accurate forecast. It will help our farmers in sowing crop in right time and reduce cost of production," Chidambaram said.
He was speaking at the first anniversary celebrations of the formation of the Ministry of Earth Sciences.
"Still India gets 70 percent of rain during monsoon, which is very whimsical. A sophisticated meteorological prediction will help our farmers," he said, adding that a comprehensive weather forecast would work as insurance for them.
He also urged the one-year-old ministry under Kapil Sibal to do extensive research on climate change and oceanography.
"It's a myth that science is difficult. We must get enthused by the way National Geographic channel and other such organisations represent science in common man's language. Talk science in people's language," he advocated.
The Ministry of Earth Sciences was formed on July 12, 2006, It includes the India Meteorological Department (IMD), National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF), Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune and Earthquake Risk Evaluation Centre (EREC).
The ministry's mandate is to look after atmospheric sciences, ocean science and technology and seismology in an integrated manner.
Minister of Science and Technology Kapil Sibal said: "We need to recognise that an organised educational infrastructure that supports sustainability and scalability is required for the ocean and earth sciences.
"We need many more educational programmes and courses that address cross disciplinary issues in earth sciences."
He also said that his ministry would come up with a weather channel with six hours of programming from May 2008 and it would be a 24-hour channel by 2012.