High rainfall has already caused delays in harvesting of atleast two commodities, coffee and cocoa. Average rainfall nationwide during the dry season, which officially starts in April, is predicted to be more than twice that of a normal year.

"Indonesia's dry season will be wet. But there is a small chance that rains will cause flooding," said Sri Diharto, chairman of Meteorology and Geophysics office. "The dry season will start in April and La Nina will subdue in August."

The dry season is generally regarded as running from April to September, but there can be regional variations.

Diharto said that the dry season this year would start in April in several parts of Java, regarded as Indonesia's rice bowl, Bali, and the eastern islands of Timor, Sumbawa and Flores.

Sumatra, Borneo and Irian Jaya, the western half of New GuineaIsland, would see the dry season in May/June, said Diharto, adding that average rainfall during the season could reach as high as 700 mm (27.6 inches) across Indonesia. Around 300 mm (11.8 inches) is considered normal.

Indonesia, one of the world's top producers of coffee, cocoa, rubber and palm oil, has been hit by high rainfall triggered by La Nina, which is caused by abnormally cold waters in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean.

Sumatra is Indonesia's main growing area for coffee, in addition to rubber and oil palm. Cocoa is grown in Sulawesi.

Some coffee traders said there would be further delay in this year's harvests to June because of continuing rains. The coffee market had earlier expected the delay to be in April from the normal crop season of March.

"We have estimated the harvest to start in April. But I am shaken by a new prediction that it will not happen until June because of the rains... and I think that's very likely," said one trader in Bandar Lampung, the provincial capital ofLampung on Sumatra.

Indonesia's coffee crop for the 1998/99 coffee season (Oct/Sept) is expected to exceed 4,00,000 tonnes, higher than the 1997/98 crop estimate of 3,60,000 tonnes.

If rains damaged the crop, traders said, output from the 1998/99 coffee crop would stay at 3,60,000 tonnes.

One cocoa trader in Ujung Pandang, capital of South Sulawesi province, said heavy rains were expected to delay the cocoa crop to June from April.

Rains are also expected to cut the country's estimated cocoa output to 3,00,000 tonnes in calendar 1999 against an earlier estimate of 3,41,000 tonnes. Indonesia produced 3,10,000 tonnes of cocoa beans in 1998.

Grain traders said rains had affected drying activity, which caused falls in the price of unhusked rice due to the high water content. Rice harvests are underway in several parts of Java and will reach their peak in May.

Traders said Indonesia might have trouble finding buyers for its corn because of the low quality while supply was abundant amid low domesticdemand during the economic crisis. The corn has a high water content.

Diharto said the meteorology office planned to install more weather radar facilities to improve weather information for farmers, adding farmers could receive such information by fax.

"They (farmers) can collect the data through the fax machine. They will know when their coffee crops will receive rains, for instance. We will develop this in Indonesia," he said.