The monitoring period is the growing and harvesting season of Aman rice. The crop condition was favorable with maximum VCI ranges between 0.5 and 1 for most of the regions.Very favorable crop condition was observed in the northwestern part of Bangladesh with a maximum VCI value larger than 1. The NDVI values for crop growing regions dropped in mid-November but gradually started increasing inearly December, indicating good crop progress. The NDVI values of the northern part of Dhaka and Sylhet increased between October and early December. The crop condition was below the previous year and the five-year average during theOctober to December period. However, it returned to normal in early January andcrop condition development reached values above the previous five yearsmaximum. Rainfall was 43% below average, while temperature and radiation wereaverage. The cropped arable land fraction was about the five-year average.Biomass accumulation was 8% above. Overall, CropWatch indicators forecast goodcrop condition due to adequate average rainfall during the key seasons over therice growing areas.

Figure3.7. Bangladesh crop condition, October 2014-January 2015

a)Crop condition development graph based on NDVI        (b)Maximum VCI

)Spatial NDVI patterns compared to 5YA                         (d)NDVI profiles