Monsoon rains ease as retreat begins

India's monsoon rains were 36% below average in the week to September 26

India's monsoon rains were 36 percent below average in the week to September 26, the weather office said on Thursday, as the four-month long rainy season draws to a close with a widespread drought avoided.

The rains were deficient -- a drought in layman's terms -- in the first half of the June-September monsoon season, which is crucial for more than half the country's farmland.

But a revival in the rains from the last week of August has alleviated the situation in much of the country with just a few states still suffering extreme dry conditions.

Rains were 44 percent above average in the previous week, reflecting the heaviest downpours in a week for the monsoon season.

Four straight weeks of heavier rains than normal from the last week of August have helped India, one of the world's leading producers and consumers of farm commodities, escape a prolonged largescale drought.

The country last faced a severe drought in 2009 and had to import sugar, pushing global prices to 30-year highs. This year, drought has hit lentils and cereal crops in some states, but rains are now just 7 percent below average in the entire season.

The revival in the monsoon has boosted production prospects for winter crops such as wheat and rapeseed by improving soil moisture before the start of the planting season from October.

The monsoon has now started retreating from the western desert state of Rajasthan, slightly late but indicating prolonged rains that can damage harvests of summer-sown crops were unlikely. The rains are expected to continue in the northeast until the end of the month.

Rains below 90 percent of a 50-year average are termed deficient by the weather office.