Agricultural Drought Indices - US Department of Agriculture
Agricultural Drought Indices - US Department of Agriculture
Agricultural Drought Indices - US Department of Agriculture
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Rainfall anomaly – September 2010<br />
Figure 2. Rainfall anomaly during September 2010 in Brazil. Source: www.inmet.gov.br.<br />
Standard Precipitation Index (SPI): SPI was developed primarily for defining and monitoring<br />
drought. It allows the user to determine the rarity <strong>of</strong> a drought at a given time scale <strong>of</strong> interest for<br />
any rainfall station with historic data. SPI is based on the cumulative probability <strong>of</strong> a given rainfall<br />
event occurring at a station (Blain 2005). The historic rainfall data <strong>of</strong> a given station is fitted to a<br />
gamma distribution. This is done through a process <strong>of</strong> maximum likelihood estimation <strong>of</strong> the<br />
gamma distribution parameters. The process described above allows the rainfall distribution for a<br />
station to be effectively represented by a mathematical cumulative probability function. Based on<br />
the historic rainfall data, one can then determine the probability <strong>of</strong> the rainfall being less than or<br />
equal to a certain amount. Thus, the probability <strong>of</strong> rainfall being less than or equal to the average<br />
rainfall for that area would be about 0.5, while the probability <strong>of</strong> rainfall being less than or equal to<br />
an amount much smaller than the average would be even lower, depending on the amount.<br />
Therefore if a particular rainfall event gives a low probability on the cumulative probability<br />
function, this is indicative <strong>of</strong> a drought event. SPI has been provided by national (INMET and<br />
AGRITEMPO) and regional (INFOSECA) M&HSs. Figure 3 presents SPI for 3 months for Brazil,<br />
to September 2010.<br />
Standard Precipitation Index (SPI)<br />
September 2010 – Accumulated for 3 months<br />
Extremely wet<br />
Severely wet<br />
Moderately wet<br />
Normal<br />
Moderately dry<br />
Severely dry<br />
Extremely dry<br />
Figure 3. SPI accumulated for 3 months (to September 2010) in Brazil. Source: www.inmet.gov.br.<br />
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