Statement on Climate of India during 2019

On January 6, 2020, India Meteorological Department (IMD) released a statement on the climate of India during 2019. The highlights of the IMD statement are:

Temperatures

·      Average temperature over India during the year 2019 was above normal. During the year, annual mean surface air temperature, averaged over the country, was +0.360C above (1981-2010 period) average.

·      The year 2019 was the seventh warmest year on record since nation-wide records commenced in 1901. However, the warming during 2019 was substantially lower than the highest warming observed over India during 2016.

·      11 out of 15 warmest years were during the recent past fifteen years (2005-2019).

·      The past decade (2001-2010/ 2010-2019) was also the warmest decade on record.

Rainfall

·      The 2019 annual rainfall over the country as a whole was 109% of its Long Period Average (LPA) value for the period 1961-2010.

·      The monsoon season (June-September) rainfall over the country as a whole was 110% of its LPA.

·      The seasonal rainfall during the North East monsoon season (October – December) over the NE Monsoon core region of the south peninsula was 109% of its LPA.

High Impact Weather Events

·      During 2019, 8 cyclonic storms formed over the Indian seas.

·      Arabian Sea contributed 5 out of these 8 cyclones against the normal of 1 per year, which equals the previous record of 1902 for the highest frequency of cyclones over the Arabian Sea.

·      The year 2019 also witnessed development of more intense cyclones over the Arabian Sea. Out of 5 systems formed in the Arabian Sea, there were two very severe cyclonic storms, one extremely severe cyclonic storm and one super cyclonic storm.

·      The cyclone activity over the Bay of Bengal during 2019 was subdued as only 3 cyclones formed against the normal of 4 per year.

·      The country also experienced other high impact weather events like, extremely heavy rainfall, heat and cold waves, snow fall, thunderstorm, dust storm, lightning, floods etc.

·      Heavy rain and flood related incidents reportedly claimed over 850 lives from different parts of the country during the pre-monsoon, monsoon and post-monsoon seasons.

India State of the Forest Report 2019

The 2019 Biennial report of Forest Survey of India was released on 30^th December 2019.

The key findings of the ISFR 2019 are as follows:

·      The total forest cover of the country is 7,12,249 sq km which is 21.67% of the geographical area of the country. The tree cover of the country is estimated as 95,027 sq km which is 2.89% of the geographical area.

·      The current assessment shows an increase of 3,976 sq km (0.56%) of forest cover, 1,212 sq km (1.29%) of tree cover and 5,188 sq km (0.65%) of forest and tree cover put together, at the national level as compared to the previous assessment of ISFR 2017.

·      The top five States in terms of increase in forest cover are Karnataka (1,025 sq km), Andhra Pradesh (990 sq km), Kerala (823 sq km), Jammu & Kashmir (371 sq km) and Himachal Pradesh (334 sq km).

·      Total forest cover in the North Eastern region is 1,70,541 sq km, which is 65.05% of its geographical area. The current assessment shows a decrease of forest cover to the extent of 765 sq km (0.45%) in the region Except Assam and Tripura, all the States in the region show decrease in forest cover.

·      Mangrove cover in the country has increased by 54 sq km (1.10%) as compared to the previous assessment.

·      The total growing stock of wood in the country is estimated 5,915.76 million cum comprising 4,273.47 million cum inside forest areas and 1,642.29 million cum outside recorded forest areas (TOF). The average growing stock per hectare in forest has been estimated as 55.69 cum.

·      Total bamboo bearing area of the country is estimated as 1,60,037 sq km. There is an increase of 3,229 sq km in bamboo bearing area as compared to the estimate of ISFR 2017.

·      In the present assessment, total carbon stock in forest is estimated as 7,124.6 million tonnes. There is an increase of 42.6 million tonnes in the carbon stock of the country as compared to the last assessment of 2017. The annual increase is 21.3 million tonnes, which is 78.1 million tonnes CO2 eq.

·      Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) represents the largest pool of carbon stock in forests, which has been estimated 4,004 million tonnes. The SOC contributes 56% to the total forest carbon stock of the country.

·      Dependence of fuelwood on forests is highest in the State of Maharashtra, whereas, for fodder, small timber and bamboo, dependence is highest in Madhya Pradesh. It has been assessed that the annual removal of the small timber by the people living in forest fringe villages is nearly 7% of the average annual yield of forests in the country.

·      Fire prone forest areas of different severity classes have been mapped in the grids of 5km x 5km based on the frequency of forest fires. The analysis reveals that 21.40% of the forest cover of the country is highly to extremely fire prone.