Monitoring of yellow sandstorms will grow more precise this year due to expanded real-time data on the origins of the seasonal nuisance.

The Korea Meteorological Administration says it began collecting real-time data on five Chinese locations in the Taklamakan Desert and near the Loess Plateau from Monday.

Joint observatories will be set up with China by March at five additional sites on the sandstorms' main path in Manchuria and the North Korean-Chinese border area.

Joint observation operations in China and Mongolia will thus grow to 18 from ten last year to enable more precise forecasts from this spring.