Association of Agrometeorologists

Assessment and monitoring of drought in Chitradurga district of Karnataka using different drought indices

S. SRIDHARA, G.M. CHAITHRA and PRADEEP GOPAKKALI

Drought is a natural disaster due to less precipitation than the normal that can occur irrespective of climate regimes. Impact assessment of drought and monitoring are the most important mitigation stratregies to combat the drought effects. As the single index cannot assess all the drought conditions, in the present study multi-variate indices approach has been used to assess and monitor drought. Five indices were assessed using precipitation data such as deciles index (DI), percent normal (PN), China-Z index (CZI), Z-Score index (ZSI) and standardized precipitation index (SPI). Monthly total precipitation data was used to calculate drought events occurred during the period 1967–2017 in different talukas of Chitradurga district of Karnataka, India. The assessment revealed that SPI, CZI and ZSI performance was similar in identifying drought. PN was very much responsive for the rainfall events that occurred during the particular year however, it exhibited variations in dry conditions. DI was not that much satisfactory in identifying drought conditions. Among the five indices assessed, SPI seems to be the best indicator to predict the drought onset than the other four drought indices. Therefore SPI can be recommended for assessing and monitoring the drought in Chitradurga district of Karnataka, India.

Drought, standardized precipitation index (SPI), deciles index (DI), percent normal (PN), China-Z index (CZI) and Z-Score index (ZSI)