Meteorological and hydrological drought assessment in Lake Malawi and Shire River basins (1970–2013)

Mtilatila, Lucy; Bronstert, Axel; Bürger, Gerd; Vormoor, Klaus

doi:10.1080/02626667.2020.1837384

Cited by 19 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…This, however, lasted for 101 months from June 1994 to October 2002. During this drought event, the lake level dropped by 0.9 m on average (Mtilatila et al, 2020a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…Runoff into the Shire River largely relies on outflow from Lake Malawi, which is mainly a function of lake level. However, the lake level has decreased by ∼1.0 m over the period 1970-2013 (Mtilatila et al, 2020a). This has created low flows on Shire River and affected the production of electricity (ESCOM, n.d.).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, according to Spinoni et al (2020), agricultural drought is defined as soil moisture deficit that leads to crop failure. Mtilatila et al (2020a) studied meteorological droughts in Lake Malawi and Upper Shire River basins based on the standardized precipitation and evapotranspiration index (SPEI) and the standardized precipitation index (SPI). They came up with eight meteorological drought events between 1970 and 2013.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They came up with eight meteorological drought events between 1970 and 2013. The majority of these events lasted for more than a year and the most severe event occurred from 1992 to 1996 (Mtilatila et al, 2020a). Regionally, these events were linked to droughts that were experienced in most of the South African countries, which have generally shown an increase in the frequency of drought events from the 1980s onwards (Rouault and Richard, 2005).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Temporal evaluation and projections of meteorological droughts in the Greater Lake Malawi Basin, Southeast Africa

2022

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The study examined the potential future changes of drought characteristics in the Greater Lake Malawi Basin in Southeast Africa. This region strongly depends on water resources to generate electricity and food. Future projections (considering both moderate and high emission scenarios) of temperature and precipitation from an ensemble of 16 bias-corrected climate model combinations were blended with a scenario-neutral response surface approach to analyses changes in: (i) the meteorological conditions, (ii) the meteorological water balance, and (iii) selected drought characteristics such as drought intensity, drought months, and drought events, which were derived from the Standardized Precipitation and Evapotranspiration Index. Changes were analyzed for a near-term (2021–2050) and far-term period (2071–2100) with reference to 1976–2005. The effect of bias-correction (i.e., empirical quantile mapping) on the ability of the climate model ensemble to reproduce observed drought characteristics as compared to raw climate projections was also investigated. Results suggest that the bias-correction improves the climate models in terms of reproducing temperature and precipitation statistics but not drought characteristics. Still, despite the differences in the internal structures and uncertainties that exist among the climate models, they all agree on an increase of meteorological droughts in the future in terms of higher drought intensity and longer events. Drought intensity is projected to increase between +25 and +50% during 2021–2050 and between +131 and +388% during 2071–2100. This translates into +3 to +5, and +7 to +8 more drought months per year during both periods, respectively. With longer lasting drought events, the number of drought events decreases. Projected droughts based on the high emission scenario are 1.7 times more severe than droughts based on the moderate scenario. That means that droughts in this region will likely become more severe in the coming decades. Despite the inherent high uncertainties of climate projections, the results provide a basis in planning and (water-)managing activities for climate change adaptation measures in Malawi. This is of particular relevance for water management issues referring hydro power generation and food production, both for rain-fed and irrigated agriculture.

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“…This, however, lasted for 101 months from June 1994 to October 2002. During this drought event, the lake level dropped by 0.9 m on average (Mtilatila et al, 2020a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Temporal evaluation and projections of meteorological droughts in the Greater Lake Malawi Basin, Southeast Africa

2022

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“…A comprehensive look at the country's problems in the natural sector, indicating the problems of water shortage crisis, intensification of destructive floods and increasing its damage, soil erosion, frequent and prolonged droughts, over‐harvesting of water resources, drainage of aquifers, negative balance is about 70% of the country's aquifers and the risk of land subsidence in the major productive and residential plains of the country (Safarianzengir & Sobhani, 2020; Sobhani & Safarianzengir, 2020; Sobhani et al, 2019b). Drought is a creeping and calm calamity that causes devastation and damage such as drought, environment, economic and social (Danandehmehr et al, 2020; Mohammad et al, 2020; Mtilatila et al, 2020). Drought is also one of the most main natural disasters in agriculture and horticulture and water resources and catchment area.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Temporal and spatial analysis and monitoring of drought (meteorology) and its impacts on environment changes in Iran

Safarianzengir

Fatahi²,

Sobhani

et al. 2022

Atmospheric Science Letters

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The consequences of climate change, primarily due to natural and human factors, have caused many problems in the last decade that have affected different sections of society. One of the most important consequences is the occurrence of natural atmospheric—climatic disasters (drought). One of these regions is Iran in the Middle East, which has been suffering from this drought in the last decade. This investigation aims to evaluate and monitor drought and its impacts on environment changes in Iran. To conduct this research, the TERRA satellite data and the MODIS sensor were used over a 21‐year period, and the Normalised Differential Vegetation Index and Palmer Drought Severity Index Indicators were used to monitor drought and to estimate the soil moisture by the Soil Moisture Calculation satellite. Finally, to estimate the amount of precipitation and evapotranspiration, cumulative precipitation and real evapotranspiration, actual evaporation and transpiration were used. Findings showed that in the investigation region, the severity and frequency of drought have increased in recent years. Soil moisture has also decreased, indicating the inverse relationship between drought intensity and soil surface moisture, meaning that as the intensity of drought increases, the amount of soil surface moisture decreases. However, in the investigation region during the study course, the accumulation of rain showed a direct relationship with evaporation and transpiration. The highest monthly drought intensity of Palmer was 5.65% in May 2000. Also, the highest amount of wet year in November 2018 is 3.6%. The highest amount of rainfall was 61.25 mm in October 2018. Based on the results obtained in this research, drought has occurred in the investigation region in recent years, the intensity of which in the south, eastern and centre half of the country, especially the provinces of south Khorasan, Semnan, Hormozgan, Sistan and Baluchestan, Khuzestan and Ilam more it has been more than other provinces. To manage and control drought in the investigation region, in the various sectors affected by drought (agriculture, environment, surface water resources, forests, pastures and watershed management and natural ecosystems) strategies and plans in the short term, medium‐term and long‐term in line with natural and human factors and climate change to be adopted.

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Multidimensional identification of single and regional meteorological drought considering flash‐season synthesis employed daily standardized effective precipitation and drought index in Guangxi, China

Yang

Tian

et al. 2023

Intl Journal of Climatology

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The frequent occurrence of extreme drought events in Guangxi has caused huge losses to human beings and economy in the region for many years.Therefore, this study adopted run theory and the objective identification method of regional extreme events (OITREE) and then carried out the comprehensive feature identification of multidimensional elements such as intensity, duration and area of meteorological drought events based on the daily standardized effective precipitation and drought index (SWAP) sequence of Guangxi from 1979 to 2018a. By comparing the evolutionary characteristics of

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Meteorological and hydrological drought assessment in Lake Malawi and Shire River basins (1970–2013)

Cited by 19 publications

References 31 publications

Temporal evaluation and projections of meteorological droughts in the Greater Lake Malawi Basin, Southeast Africa

Temporal evaluation and projections of meteorological droughts in the Greater Lake Malawi Basin, Southeast Africa

Temporal and spatial analysis and monitoring of drought (meteorology) and its impacts on environment changes in Iran

Multidimensional identification of single and regional meteorological drought considering flash‐season synthesis employed daily standardized effective precipitation and drought index in Guangxi, China

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