The first rain from India's annual monsoon, which is crucial to its farm-dependent economy, hit the southwest coast on Monday, a weather official said. "The onset of the annual southwest monsoon has begun over Kerala today," said K. Santosh, director of the Indian meteorological department's office in Thiruvananthapuram, the capital of Kerala state.
A monsoon season, which lasts from June to September, is considered normal if the rains equal 98 percent to 102 percent of the annual average. This year the rainfall is expected to reach about 95 percent.
The season accounts for about 80 percent of India's annual rainfall, vital for the farm economy, which lacks adequate irrigation facilities.
The monsoon is expected to expand over southern India in the next two days to include the neighboring states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
"Conditions are favourable for a further advance of the southwest monsoon over some parts of coastal and south Karnataka and parts of Tamil Nadu during the next 48 hours," Santosh said.
The agriculture sector employs more than 60 percent of India's workforce and generates over a fifth of India's gross domestic product.
However, flooding from the rains also causes hundreds of deaths and steep financial damage to homes and farms across India.
In the country's financial hub, Mumbai, in 2005 more than 400 people died as silted drains were unable to handle a surprise deluge of monsoon rains that flooded the seaside city.
Source: Agence France-Presse
