Centre launches Mission Mausam to improve weather forecasting capabilities

Mission Mausam will focus on providing highly accurate and timely weather and climate information, including monsoon forecasts, alerts for air quality, extreme weather events and cyclones.

New Delhi: Centre approved has approved ‘Mission Mausam’ a transformative initiative to tremendously boost India’s weather and climate-related science, research, and services.

Union Cabinet has approved the mission with total outlay of Rs.2,000 crore for over two years. The Mission Mausam, to be chiefly implemented by the Ministry of Earth Sciences, is envisaged to be a multi-faceted and transformative initiative to tremendously boost India’s weather and climate-related science, research, and services.

It will help to better equip stakeholders, including citizens and last-mile users, in tackling extreme weather events and the impacts of climate change.

The ambitious program will help broaden capacity and resilience across communities, sectors, and ecosystems in the long run.

As part of the Mission Mausam, India will exponentially expound research and development, and capacity in atmospheric sciences, especially weather surveillance, modelling, forecasting, and management.

“By integrating advanced observation systems, high-performance computing, and cutting-edge technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning, Mission Mausam will set a new benchmark for predicting weather with high precision” said the Ministry of Earth and Sciences.

The mission’s focus will include improving observations and understanding for providing highly accurate and timely weather and climate information, including monsoon forecasts, alerts for air quality, extreme weather events and cyclones.

Critical elements of Mission Mausam will include the deployment of next-generation radars and satellite systems with advanced sensors and high-performance supercomputers, the development of improved Earth system models and a GIS-based automated Decision Support System for real-time data dissemination.

The Ministry claimed that the Mission Mausam will directly benefit numerous sectors, such as agriculture, disaster management, defence, environment, aviation, water resources, power, tourism, shipping, transport, energy, and health.

It would also enhance data-driven decision making in areas such as urban planning, road and rail transport, offshore operations, and environmental monitoring.

Three institutes of the Ministry of Earth Sciences, the India Meteorological Department, the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, and the National Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasting will primarily implement Mission Mausam.