Short-to-medium range hydrologic forecast to manage water and agricultural resources in India

Water resources and agriculture are often affected by the weather anomalies in India resulting in a disproportionate damage. While short to medium range prediction systems and forecast products are available, a skilful hydrologic forecast of runoff and root-zone soil moisture that can provide timely information has been lacking in India. Using precipitation and air temperature forecasts from the Climate Forecast System v2 (CFSv2), Global Ensemble Forecast System (GEFSv2) and four products from Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), here we show that the IITM ensemble mean (mean of all four products from IITM) can be used operationally to provide hydrologic forecast in India at 7–45 days lead time. The IITM ensemble mean forecast was further improved using bias correction for precipitation and air temperature. Forecast based on the IITM-ensemble mean showed better skill in majority of India for all the lead times (7–45 days) in comparison to the other forecast products. Moreover, the VIC simulated forecast of runoff and soil moisture successfully captured the observed anomalies during the severe droughts years. The findings reported herein have strong implications for providing timely information that can help farmers and water managers in decision making in India.