Vol. 10, Special Issue 8 (2021)

Author(s):
Archana GH and Shweta Gautam

Abstract:
Drought is one of the most complex and least understood natural disasters that badly affect growing or living conditions Rainfall is to be believed as a normal, wet and dry condition of the climate. It is one of the most important water associated hazards. It has great impact on agricultural, hydrological, economic, environmental and social systems. Understanding these impacts is crucial for drought planning, mitigation, and response. It also helps decision makers identify and reduce vulnerability to drought. Drought monitoring is a key component of drought preparedness and the standardized precipitation index (SPI) has several characteristics that are an upgrading over other indices, with its simplicity and flexibility. The objective of this study was to analyze drought severity using SPI method for observing and describing drought based on thirty (30) year precipitation data of central dry zone of karnataka (1985 - 2014). Positive SPI values point to normal condition to wet condition and negative values indicate normal condition to dry condition. SPI method resulted in showing extreme drought events in the year 1985, 1989, 1990 and 1995, whereas the major extreme drought event occurred in 1985 was really caused by the low rainfall. The results show that the annual drought classification system proved to be efficient in the identification of events. The results of this study will be useful in understanding the historic patterns and build future scenarios of drought for risk management and climate change adaptation planning. Further research should include relating dryness patterns with pastoral systems, cropping pattern and crop production.