Why monsoon season will not solve India’s water crisis

AFTER A SCORCHING summer, most parts of India are enjoying a drenching from monsoons that arrived in late May. But the downpours will provide only limited relief. Several eastern and northern states had the driest July on record; the India Meteorological Department has warned that below-average rainfall is likely to continue this month and next. Many parts of the country will continue to suffer acute water shortages in the coming year—and for many years to come. Why?

Some 600m Indians—more than 40% of the population—rely on agriculture for their living. A little over half of the country’s farmland is not irrigated. Instead it is watered by the rains. But climate change has made monsoon patterns erratic. A study published in Nature Communications in 2017 found that rainfall in India’s central belt decreased by 10% between 1950 and 2015. The impact of that decline was compounded by the increase in particularly heavy downpours, the frequency of which rose by 75% over the same period. Heavy rain does not penetrate and irrigate the soil, but erodes it, damaging farmland rather than helping crops to flourish. That India’s rainfall is concentrated into shorter periods also means that dry spells are lengthier. This year Kolkata went 61 days without rain, its longest stretch since 2000.