-The Hindu 8.5 % less rain than normal against prediction of excess. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has erred on its forecast for monsoon rain in August. In June, it said that India would get more rain than it usually did but as of August 31, the country got significantly less — or 8.5 % less rain — than what’s normal for the month, according to the IMD website. While this wouldn’t affect...

-The Indian Express “Due to the large-scale deforestation, there has been a significant drop in the amount of rainfall received,” said Subimal Ghosh, a faculty member associated with the study. Mumbai: DEFORESTATION AND conversion of forest land to crop land has weakened the monsoon in India, a study by a team from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Bombay has found. The team from the Interdisciplinary Program in Climate Studies of IIT-B studied...

-Hindustan Times The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has called on governments to incorporate pro-women fiscal measures in budgets, so as to bridge the gender gap. In its first-ever global review of the use of tax and spending policies to promote gender equality, IMF has found that financial policies in Union and state budgets have helped gender parity. Highlighting changes across 80 countries, the IMF study, Tackling Gender Inequality, says fiscal policy efforts were...

-The Indian Express A senior state official said that the objective would be on environmental training focused on protecting water resources, preventing deforestation, safer pesticide use, and mitigating impacts of extreme climatic condition on farm produce Mumbai: After facing three severe drought spell in four years, Maharashtra has decided to embrace climate-smart agriculture. On August 10, the state cabinet gave its nod for an ambitious project of training farmers in 4,900 villages...

-Hindustan Times Mumbai: The government’s ambitious plan to interlink India’s rivers for better distribution of water across the country may need to be tweaked to factor in the effects of climate change. An analysis of weather data for 103 years (1901 to 2004) by researchers from the Indian Institutes of Technology in Mumbai and Chennai shows that rainfall has decreased over the years, reducing water stocks even in river basins that have...