ABSTRACT:The study of the temporal-spatial variability of dry sequences and the probability of their occurrence are particularly important in understanding the impact of climate change on droughts.This paper analyses the different properties of dry sequences, focussing on extreme condition, analysing their degree of spatial coherence, and their temporal variability. For the study, daily precipitation data are used for the period 1961-2000 throughout Argentina.The region north of 40°S is divided in two from the meridian of 63°W with highly differentiated 'dry' properties. The eastern region is more homogeneous where mean dry sequences last less than six days and long sequences of about 60 days. The Andean region shows a marked east-west gradient in any of the above properties, with extreme values of over 10 days (mean sequences) and 150 days (the longest sequences). At the seasonal level the above properties reflect a differential pattern according to the time of year under study. In the case of summer, when the dry sequences can be more harmful to crops, the maximum duration in the Pampa region can extend to about 25 days.Owing to the problems that dry sequences of over 30 days can produce in the different ecosystems and based on the above findings, the temporal-spatial variability is analysed, and a variability over the years, together with a progressive decrease in the occurrence of such events, is found.The study of extreme dry events provides useful tools that can be applied to different hydrological and agricultural needs. Furthermore, our climatological findings help validate climate models.

An important goal of this work is to study the variability of corn and soya bean crop yields in four countries with large production and substantial commercial trade in these commodities. This problem can be investigated in terms of the role that these two crops play in food programmes and in terms of the use of both crops for energy production. Four countries were chosen and divided into six production areas. A climatic summary was made of the annual cycles of extreme temperatures and precipitation. Their assessment in agriculture programmes was likewise summarized. It is seen that the variability range of the temperatures and precipitation are broad and different for each region. This finding indicates the high adaptability of these crops. This concept of adaptability is used to compare the coefficients for precipitation and crop yield. Results of the study show that corn crops show less year-to-year variability than do soya bean crops. The United States and the northern part of China are the regions that best use the rain supply with respect to crop yield. Soya bean crops show a greater year-to-year variability in the ratio of precipitation to crop yields. Argentina, the United States and northern China are the areas that best use the rain supply. To compare crop yields with climatic variables in the different regions, three types of regression model were used. The best fit is obtained by using the maximum temperatures and accumulated precipitation for each growth stage over the growing season.

Understanding and monitoring extreme events is essential, particularly in river discharges from the La Plata Basin, which concentrates a large percentage of the economic resources and population of the region. In this article, we seek to quantify the relationship between extreme events in discharge and the seasonal climatic index NIÑO 3.4. We start by estimating the phase shift between the index and mean seasonal (trimester) discharge values. Based on this result, we align the series and use the copula method to fit a joint distribution. We end up with a model that is particularly useful for quantifying the probability of occurrence of extreme events and monitoring their return periods. As a final step, we generate predictions and validate the model