During the current monitoring period, theharvest of summer crops was completed and winter crops were in the earlyvegetative stages under mostly favorable weather conditions. The regionexperienced slightly below normal thermal conditions, while rainfall increasedby 10% and RADPAR dropped by 3%. 

According to the rainfallprofiles, almost all areas of Central Europe to Western Russia enjoyed approximatelyaverage precipitation from October through to December, while abundant rainfallwas recorded in the southwest of Russia between late December and earlyJanuary, including Krasnodarskiy and Stavropolskiy Krays and the Oblastsof Rostovskaya and Volgogradskaya. From November, the MPZ enjoyedwarmer-than-average temperatures, including temperature departures as high as+4°C in early December in most regions. In the second and third dekad ofDecember, remarkably below average temperatures prevailed over Central Europe,reaching 8°C below average in southern Belarus in January. As a result of badweather conditions during the sowing stages of winter crops (see the November2015 Bulletin), crop conditions in eastern Ukraine and many parts of southernRussia were well below average, which is confirmed by the maximum VCIdistribution map (Figure 2.6).  

BIOMSS is up 1%compared to the recent five-year average. 83% of the arable lands were croppedfrom October 2015 to January 2016. Most uncropped arable land was scattered inthe south of western Russia (including the Oblasts of Volgogradskaya,Saratovskaya and Samarskaya).The maximum VCI (0.69) of this MPZ is much lower thanthat of other MPZs. According to the VHI map of this monitoring period, mostpixels of southern Ukraine and Russia showed bad soil moisture conditions.

In conclusion, belowaverage production is to be expected in Central Europe and Western Russia.

Figure 2.6.Central Europe-Western Russia MPZ: Agroclimatic and agronomic indicators,October 2015-January 2016