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Full-Text Articles in Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology
Poor Water Resources And Drought In The Gujarat/Saurashtra Regions Of India, K. K. Nathan
Poor Water Resources And Drought In The Gujarat/Saurashtra Regions Of India, K. K. Nathan
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Inadequate water resources pose a big threat to the economy, human activities, and livelihood in the Gujarat/Saurashtra regions of India. Scanty rainfall with wide aberrations in its distribution has made the situation worse, leading to chronic drought in the state in 2001. With the exception of the Narmada and Tapi rivers, there are hardly any water resources to sustain agricultural production in the region. The gradual disappearance of forest cover in the state has further aggravated the drought situation. This has led to large-scale erosion of the topsoil, particularly near the riverside. There is apprehension that the region will soon …
Creating A Network Of Regional Drought Preparedness Networks: A Call For Action, Donald A. Wilhite
Creating A Network Of Regional Drought Preparedness Networks: A Call For Action, Donald A. Wilhite
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Drought is a creeping, slow-onset natural hazard that is a normal part of climate for virtually all regions of the world; it results in serious economic, social, and environmental impacts. Its onset and end are often difficult to determine, as is its severity. Drought affects more people than any other natural hazard. Lessons from developed and developing countries demonstrate that drought results in significant impacts, regardless of level of development, although the character of these impacts will differ profoundly. At the Meeting on Opportunities for Sustainable Investment in Rainfed Areas of West Asia and North Africa (WANA), held in June …
Announcements: Summer/Fall 2001
Announcements: Summer/Fall 2001
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Contents:
Allocating and Managing Water for a Sustainable Future: Lessons from Around the World
Defending the Integrity of Ground Water: Understanding the Impacts of Natural and Manmade Disasters
Conference on Energy Climate, Environment and Water—Issues and Opportunities for Irrigation and Drainage
An Analysis Of Recent Drought Conditions In Turkey In Relation To Circulation Patterns, Ali Umran Komuscu
An Analysis Of Recent Drought Conditions In Turkey In Relation To Circulation Patterns, Ali Umran Komuscu
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Drought commonly is perceived to be a prolonged period with a significant reduction in precipitation. Namias (1985) argues that drought is associated with persistent or persistently recurring atmospheric circulation patterns. For example, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) has a major role in controlling European climate and appears to exert a strong influence in modulating North Atlantic ecosystems. During the positive phases of NAO, the North Atlantic westerlies, which provide much of the atmospheric moisture to north Africa and Europe, shift northward. This, in turn, results in drier conditions over southern Europe, the Mediterranean Sea, and northern Africa (Hurrell, 1995; Hurrell …
Announcements: Spring 2001
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Contents:
IAEM’s 49th Annual Conference and Exhibit
International Conference on Drought Mitigation and Prevention of Land Desertification
New Book
Results Of A Rapid Appraisal Study: Agricultural Producers’ Perceptions Of Drought Vulnerability And Mitigation—Howard County, Nebraska, Cody L. Knutson, Matthew L. Blomstedt, Kara Slaughter
Results Of A Rapid Appraisal Study: Agricultural Producers’ Perceptions Of Drought Vulnerability And Mitigation—Howard County, Nebraska, Cody L. Knutson, Matthew L. Blomstedt, Kara Slaughter
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Drought is the leading natural disaster in the United States in terms of monetary losses. The National Research Council (1995) estimates that drought costs the United States an average of $6–8 billion per year. Because of these losses and the great effects of drought on many citizens’ quality of life, drought planning is gaining widespread support in the United States. However, U.S. drought planning within the agricultural sector has historically focused on response measures that help producers, primarily farmers, deal with and recover from drought. It has been found that these often ad-hoc drought responses are very expensive and do …
Droughts And Dew Bean Productivity In Northwestern Arid Rajasthan, India, Pratap Narain, R. S. Singh, D. Kumar
Droughts And Dew Bean Productivity In Northwestern Arid Rajasthan, India, Pratap Narain, R. S. Singh, D. Kumar
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Arid ecosystems constitute an important part of the world’s dry climates. The Indian arid zone is characterized by a harsh and fragile system, which influences the productivity (both quantitative and qualitative) and socioeconomic status of the inhabitants. The study discussed in this article was conducted in the Bikaner region, which is one of the most drought-prone districts of Rajasthan (Figure 1). Annual rainfall in the district is 268 mm, of which 85% occurs during the southwest summer monsoon (July–September). The region is known to experience extreme variations in diurnal and seasonal temperatures and high wind velocity, particularly during summers, associated …
Winter Drought In Iran: Associations With Enso, M. J. Nazemosadat
Winter Drought In Iran: Associations With Enso, M. J. Nazemosadat
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The Islamic Republic of Iran (Figure 1) has an area of 1,648,000 km2 and a population of 65 million people (1995 estimate). The country has arid and semiarid climates and the occurrence of rainfall is unreliable, with a coefficient of variation as high as 70%. The average annual precipitation over the country is around 250 mm. Two mountain ridges, the Alborz and Zagros (Figure 1), which run east and southeast from the northwest corner of the country, play an influential role in determining the amount and spatial distribution of rainfall. The peaks of Alborz and Zagros are about 5,700 …
From The Director: Spring 2001, Donald A. Wilhite
From The Director: Spring 2001, Donald A. Wilhite
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
I recently participated in an advanced course, “Management Strategies to Mitigate Drought in the Mediterranean: Monitoring, Risk Analysis, and Contingency Planning”, in Rabat, Morocco (May 21– 26). The course was organized by the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Zaragoza (CIHEAM– IAMZ) and the Institut Agronomique et Veterinaire Hassan II in Rabat, Morocco, with contribution from the European Commission. The National Drought Mitigation Center’s Mark Svoboda also participated. Other lecturers included M. Wassif (Desert Research Center, Cairo); Eddy dePauw (ICARDA); Ana Iglesias (Universidad Politecnica, Madrid, and Center for Climate Systems Research, Columbia University); Karl Monnik (Institute for Soil, Climate and Water/ARC, South …
Announcements: Fall 2000
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Contents:
2000 National Disaster Medical System Conference
Management Strategies to Mitigate Drought in the Mediterranean: Monitoring, Risk Analysis and Contingency Planning
Potential Use Of Noaa/Avhrr Satellite Data For Monitoring Environmental Change In Turkey, Ali Umran Komuscu
Potential Use Of Noaa/Avhrr Satellite Data For Monitoring Environmental Change In Turkey, Ali Umran Komuscu
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
In Turkey, desertification has been taking place in areas of low rainfall and minimal vegetative cover. In particular, the central, eastern, and southeastern parts of the country are vulnerable to desertification because of erosion, deforestation, and degradation of vegetative cover. Rivers of those regions are characterized by very high sediment yields. Nearly 60% of the country’s soils are subjected to severe erosion and approximately 450 million tons of sediment are carried to rivers each year. Meanwhile, wind erosion has been a very effective desertification process in central and southeastern parts of the country, where annual rainfall varies around 400–500 mm/year. …
Workshop On Drought-Related Issues In Fars Province, Iran: Critical Points And Resolutions, M. J. Nazemosadat, S. Amin, A. A. Kamgare-Haghighi, D. Khalili
Workshop On Drought-Related Issues In Fars Province, Iran: Critical Points And Resolutions, M. J. Nazemosadat, S. Amin, A. A. Kamgare-Haghighi, D. Khalili
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
As a result of the occurrence of overwhelming severe drought over most parts of the Islamic Republic of Iran, an educational/professional workshop on drought issues was held at the College of Agriculture, Shiraz University in Iran, October 18–19, 2000. The workshop was sponsored by the College of Agriculture, the office of Fars Provincial Government, the Agricultural Bank, and Shiraz Abfa Company. The workshop was mainly focused on the assessment of drought impacts and severity in Fars province, in the southern part of Iran.
The inauguration ceremony was attended by some of the parliament members (from Fars province), the Chancellor of …
Improving Drought Early Warning Systems In The Context Of Drought Preparedness And Mitigation, Donald A. Wilhite, M. V. K. Sivakumar, Deborah Wood
Improving Drought Early Warning Systems In The Context Of Drought Preparedness And Mitigation, Donald A. Wilhite, M. V. K. Sivakumar, Deborah Wood
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Effective drought early warning systems are an integral part of efforts worldwide to improve drought preparedness. Timely and reliable data and information must be the cornerstone of effective drought policies and plans. In pursuit of the goal of improving the effectiveness of drought early warning systems, participants of the experts meeting were asked to address three fundamental questions:
1. What is your assessment of the current status of drought early warning systems?
2. What are the shortcomings, limitations, and needs for drought early warning systems?
3. How can drought early warning systems be improved to better support drought preparedness and …
Using The Spi To Monitor The 1999-2000 Drought In Northeastern Argentina, Roberto Zanvettor, Andres Ravelo
Using The Spi To Monitor The 1999-2000 Drought In Northeastern Argentina, Roberto Zanvettor, Andres Ravelo
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Drought risk is a major concern across many regions of Argentina because precipitation is extremely variable. One of these regions, the Pampas, is the main agricultural and livestock production area, extending over 60 million hectares. This region was recently surveyed to detect, monitor, and assess the occurrence of drought using a network of 27 meteorological stations and the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), developed by McKee et al. (1993). The SPI has various categories that define drought intensities. A period is considered humid when the SPI value is greater than +1 and a period is considered dry when the value of …
From The Director: Fall 2000, Donald A. Wilhite
From The Director: Fall 2000, Donald A. Wilhite
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The NDMC hosted the first annual “Drought Monitor Forum” in November. Most of the readers of Drought Network News are probably aware of the Drought Monitor web site (http://enso.unl.edu/ monitor/index.html) and the products that are provided to users. (Mark Svoboda of the NDMC provided an overview of the Drought Monitor product in the Winter/Spring 2000 issue of Drought Network News.) This weekly product, jointly produced by the NDMC, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, has been widely accepted in the United States, and other countries are considering the adoption of a similar technique for mapping drought …
The Climatic Impact Of La Niña-Related Droughts In Entre Rios (Argentina), Alicia E. Codromaz De Rojas
The Climatic Impact Of La Niña-Related Droughts In Entre Rios (Argentina), Alicia E. Codromaz De Rojas
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The National Institute of Tecnologia Agropecuaria (INTA) at Parana, Entre Rios (Argentina), has a farming experimental station (E.E.A.) located at 31.5°S and 60.31°W, 110m above sea level. A meteorological observatory has existed at the site since 1934.
The region has a temperate humid climate and receives an average annual rainfall total of 1,000 mm. Distribution is monsoonal, with October–April rains accounting for 73% of the annual total.
Since August 1998, the area has been affected by La Niña, and experts expected the conditions of the cold episode to persist into 2000. The La Niña event in the humid Pampean region …
Announcements: Summer 2000
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Contents:
Disaster Management Workshops
Fifth Annual Conference on Crises and Disasters Management
DROUGHT 2000 Conference: Impacts, Policy, and Technology
16th Annual International Conference on Contaminated Soils, Sediments and Water
Conclusions And Recommendations From The Central And Eastern European Workshop On Drought Mitigation
Conclusions And Recommendations From The Central And Eastern European Workshop On Drought Mitigation
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The importance of prevention and planning in drought mitigation was the impetus for the Central and Eastern European Workshop on Drought Mitigation, held April 12–15, 2000, in Budapest-Felsoőgöd, Hungary. The workshop was organized and sponsored by several Hungarian agencies: the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development; Ministry for Environment; Ministry of Transport, Communication and Water Management; Research and Development Division of the Ministry of Education; and Hungarian Meteorological Service. The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), World Meteorological Organization (WMO), European Commission Joint Research Centre (EC JRC–ISPRA), European Regional …
India’S Arid Region And The Current Drought, Pratap Narain, K. D. Sharma, A. S. Rao, D. V. Singh, B. K. Mathur, Usha Rani Ahuja
India’S Arid Region And The Current Drought, Pratap Narain, K. D. Sharma, A. S. Rao, D. V. Singh, B. K. Mathur, Usha Rani Ahuja
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
We recently surveyed some of the drought-affected areas (Figure 1) in the Indian arid region in a publication entitled “Strategy to Combat Drought and Famine in the Indian Arid Zone.” This article is a summary of the report.
The present drought in the arid and semiarid regions of India is due to the cumulative effect of inadequate rainfall during 1997–99. Twelve states in India are in the grip of severe drought, with Rajasthan, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh (Table 1) being the most affected. The Indian arid zone encompasses 32 million ha and is highly prone to droughts and …
The Drought In Chile And La Niña, Juan Quintana
The Drought In Chile And La Niña, Juan Quintana
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Precipitation is one of the climatic elements most affected by the presence of La Niña in Chile. An important precipitation deficit begins during La Niña events, from latitude 45°S to the north. This deficit prevails most of the year, with winter (April–September) being most vulnerable to these anomalies. The central region of Chile (30°S to 40°S) has negative anomalies, with precipitation values 35% to 100% below the climatologic annual average. These rain deficiencies in Chile are determined by the persistence of anomalies of anticyclonal circulation of middle and subtropical latititudes and an area of anomalies of cyclonic circulation in the …
Talking Imperative For Grieving Farmers, Others, Cheryl Alberts
Talking Imperative For Grieving Farmers, Others, Cheryl Alberts
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Farmers who are losing their livelihoods to the drought shouldn’t be surprised to feel depressed or angry, and neither should people around them. After all, these farmers are suffering a very real loss and they are grieving.
Farmers who lose a crop in many ways will react as have people who have lost loved ones, said John DeFrain, family and community development specialist at the University of Nebraska here. That is, they go into shock, denial and anger, and not necessarily in that order.
The loss of a crop means a loss of time, expenses, identity and, in some cases, …
From The Director: Summer 2000, Donald A. Wilhite
From The Director: Summer 2000, Donald A. Wilhite
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
We had a fairly good response to the call in the previous issue of Drought Network News for readers to receive future issues online. I would encourage more of you to consider this option, as it will save distribution costs and expedite receipt of the newsletter. If you are willing to receive the newsletter electronically, please contact Kim Klemsz (kklemsz2@unl.edu). Our plan is to notify you via e-mail when each new issue of Drought Network News is available. Back issues of Drought Network News are also available online.
At this writing, I am making final preparations for the Expert Group …
Using The Spi To Identify Drought, C. T. Agnew
Using The Spi To Identify Drought, C. T. Agnew
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
This article was written in response to the recent analysis of drought in Turkey by Komuscu (1999). The study showed the relationship between drought duration, drought frequency, and drought time scale using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI).
Announcements: Spring 2000
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Contents:
Droughts: A Global Assessment
Proceedings of the National Workshop on Dynamic Crop Simulation Modeling for Agrometeorological Advisory Services
Central and Eastern European Workshop on Drought Mitigation
11th Global Warming International Conference and Expo
GLOBE Data Set
Revisiting The Spi: Clarifying The Process, Michael J. Hayes
Revisiting The Spi: Clarifying The Process, Michael J. Hayes
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The number of applications using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) around the world continues to increase (e.g., Agnew, pp. 6–12 of this newsletter, and Komuscu 1999). However, there are relatively few publications explaining the SPI, and occasional misconceptions about the index have occurred.
When the SPI was first developed by McKee et al. (1993, 1995), it was meant to address some of the limitations that exist within the Palmer Drought Index (PDI). These first publications were relatively simple introductions of the SPI to the scientific community, appearing in the Proceedings of the Eighth and Ninth Applied Climatology Conferences, respectively, sponsored …
Characteristics Of Drought In Kerala, India, K. K. Nathan
Characteristics Of Drought In Kerala, India, K. K. Nathan
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
Kerala state in India, which is the first area of the country to experience the southwest monsoon, has a moist and wet climate. Kerala is in the extreme southwestern part of the Indian subcontinent; it borders Karnataka state in the north, Tamil Nadu in the east, and the Arabian Sea in the west (Figure 1). The entire state is one of the 35 meteorological subdivisions in India.
Kerala’s climate is tropical monsoon and tropical savanna, according to Koppen’s climatic classification (Figure 1). The state normally experiences excessive seasonal rainfall, with hot summers (except in the extreme southern districts like Trivandrum, …
An Introduction To The Drought Monitor, Mark Svoboda
An Introduction To The Drought Monitor, Mark Svoboda
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The idea of better monitoring and assessing drought has been a quest of NDMC director Don Wilhite for more than two decades. He has been an advocate of better climate monitoring, particularly drought monitoring, because drought is a normal, recurring hazard in virtually all of the United States. The challenge is to recognize drought, a slow-onset or “creeping” natural disaster, before a region is in the middle of one.
The most recent surge in interest in drought arose during the 1995–96 drought in the Southwest and southern Great Plains states. At the NDMC we discussed how we could do a …
From The Director: Spring 2000, Donald A. Wilhite
From The Director: Spring 2000, Donald A. Wilhite
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
I hope that those of our readers with Internet access will consider receiving future issues of Drought Network News online. We realize that some of you do not have access to the Internet, so we will continue to publish hard copies of the newsletter. If you are willing to receive the newsletter electronically, please contact Kim Klemsz as soon as possible. Our plan is to notify readers via email when each new issue of Drought Network News is available. Back issues of the newsletter are also available online.
This is a joint winter/spring issue of Drought Network News. It …
A Drought Watch System For Southeast Spain, Ramon Garrido Abenza
A Drought Watch System For Southeast Spain, Ramon Garrido Abenza
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
One of the main climatological characteristics of the region of Murcia (11,300 km2), located almost entirely in the Segura Basin (in southeast Spain), is the great temporal and spatial irregularity of its precipitation. Average annual precipitation values range between 200 and 500 mm, and coefficients of variation (CV) are high, with some values about 50%. It is a semiarid region (including a small arid area), and agriculture plays a major role in its economy. Because of this, drought is one characteristic of the region’s climate that has far-reaching consequences, from unemployment to social conflicts.
It is important to define drought …
Drought Follows The Deluge In Vermont, Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux
Drought Follows The Deluge In Vermont, Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux
Drought Network News (1994-2001)
The incidence of both drought and flooding on the Vermont landscape within the same calendar year is not an uncommon occurrence. The year 1998 was no exception, in that the ice storm of January and statewide flooding of June/July finally gave way to drought conditions as the year drew to a close. These dry conditions continued into late June/early July 1999, when a series of convective and frontal systems brought steady rainfall amounts that were helpful in reducing the surface moisture deficits. Hydrologic deficits, however, still existed in mid-July.
With the exception of the most severe events, which can span …