Abstract
Drought is a natural disaster that occurs frequently or intermittently and affects all economic, social, and environmental aspects of a society. The present study is an attempt to compare different drought indices and select the best drought index for drought monitoring in Iran. To this end, seven drought indices including SPI, PN, ZSI, DI, CZI, EDI, and MCZI were used for 1-, 3-, 6-, 12-, and 24-month timescales. The monthly precipitation data of 41 synoptic stations in Iran over a period of 28 years (1985–2013) were used in order to achieve the research objectives. After the required databases were obtained, the effective drought index (EDI) was used as a basic indicator and as the basis of calculations in order to choose the best index for drought monitoring. The results showed that the EDI index indicates the general drought classes better than other indices. Of the indices used in the study, three indices namely ZSI, SPI, and CZI showed the highest consistency in their behavior. In addition, the 6-, 12-, and 24-month timescales showed very similar drought results in the abovementioned indices. Moreover, the behavior of DI and PN indices proved to be inconsistent with the behavior of other indices, and these indices proved to be unsuitable for drought monitoring in Iran. The MCZI index, as compared to the EDI index, showed no acceptable performance in drought monitoring. Finally, SPI and EDI indices were detected as the first and second best indices for drought monitoring in Iran.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Akhtari R, Mahdian MH, Morid S (2007) Assessment of spatial analysis of SPI and EDI drought indices in Tehran Province. Iran-Water Resour Res 2(3):27–38
Akhtari R, Morid S, Mahdian MH, Smakhtin V (2009) Assessment of areal interpolation methods for spatial analysis of SPI and EDI drought indices. Int J Climatol 29(1):135–145. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1691
Ameziane T, Ouassou A, Ziyad A, Belghihti M (2003) Drought risk analysis and impacts evaluation in Morocco. Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD)
Ansari H (2004) Monitoring and zoning of drought using fuzzy logic and GIS. Tarbiat modarres university, Tehran
Barua S, Ng AWM, Perera BJC (2011) Comparative evaluation of drought indexes: case study on the Yarra River catchment in Australia. J Water Resour Plan Manag 137(2):215–226. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)WR.1943-5452.0000105
Bazrafshan J (2011) Application of log-linear models for analysis of the SPI drought class transitions in old weather stations of Iran during 20th century. Iran Water Res J 4(7):109–118
Bhalme HN, Mooley DA (1980) Large-scale droughts/floods and monsoon circulation. Mon Weather Rev 108(8):1197–1211
Byun HR, Wilhite DA (1999) Objective quantification of drought severity and duration. J Clim 12(9):2747–2756
Dogan S, Berktay A, Singh VP (2012) Comparison of multi-monthly rainfall-based drought severity indices, with application to semi-arid Konya closed basin, Turkey. J Hydrol 470–471:255–268. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2012.09.003
Eder BK, Davis JM (1987) Spatial and temporal analysis of the palmer drought severity index over the south-eastern United States. J Climatol 7(1):31–56. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.3370070105
Gibbs W J, Maher J V (1967) Rainfall deciles as drought indicators. Bureau of Meteorology, Bulletin No. 48, Melbourne, Australia
Hayes M J (2000) Drought indices. National Drought Mitigation Center, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, USA
Hayes M J, Svoboda M D, Wilhite D A, Vanyarkho O V (1999) Monitoring the 1996 drought using the standardized precipitation index, National Drought Mitigation Center, Ling coln, Nebraska. 80(3), 429–438. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0477(1999)080<0429:MTDUTS>2.0.CO;2
Jain VK, Pandey RP, Jain MK, Byun H-R (2015) Comparison drought indices for appraisal of drought characteristics in the Ken River Basin. Weather Clim Extremes 8:1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wace.2015.05.002
Kalamaras N, Michalopoulou H, Byun HR (2010) Detection of drought events in Greece using daily precipitation. Hydrol Res 41(2):126–133. https://doi.org/10.2166/nh.2010.001
Kendall MG, Stuart A (1977) The advanced theory of statistics. In: Distribution theory. Charles Griffin Company, London, pp 400–401
Keyantash J, Dracup J A (2002) The quantification of drought: an evaluation of drought indices. Bull Am Meteorol Soc, 83(8), 1167–1180. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0477(2002)083<1191: TQODAE>2.3.CO;2
Khalili N, davari K, Ansari H, Alizadeh A (2010) The management of supplementary irrigation for rain fed wheat during the drought periods using crop moisture index (the case study: Bojnurd). J Water Soil 24(6):1254–1264
Kim DW, Byun HR (2009) Future pattern of Asian drought under global warming scenario. Theor Appl Climatol 98(1):137–150. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-008-0100-y
Kim DW, Byun HR, Choi KS (2009) Evaluation, modification and application of the effective drought index to 200-year drought climatology of Seoul, Korea. J Hydrol 378:1–2), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2009.08.021
Loukas A, Vasiliades L (2004) Probabilistic analysis of drought spatiotemporal characteristics in Thessaly Region, Greece. Nat Hazards Earth Syst Sci 4(5–6):719–731. https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-4-719-2004
Masoodian S A (2012) Climate of Iran, Sharia -E- Tous Press, Mashhad, Iran, 217 pp. (In Persian)
Mavromatis T (2010) Use of drought indices in climate change impact assessment studies: an application to Greece. Int J Climatol 30(9):1336–1348. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1976
McKee T B, Doesken N J, Kleist J (1993) The relationship of drought frequency and duration to time scales. 8th Conference on Applied Climatology, 17–22 January, Anaheim, USA
Moghadasi M, Paymozd S, Morid S (2005) Monitoring the drought during 1998 to 2000 in Tehran province, using EDI, SPI, DI indices and geographical information system. J Spatial Plan 9(1):197 217 (In Persian)
Morid S, Paymozd SH (2008) Comparison of hydrological and meteorological methods for daily drought monitoring: a case study, the 1998-2000 drought spell of Tehran, Iran. J Water Soil Sci 11(42):325–333
Morid S, Smakhtin V, Moghaddasi M (2006) Comparison of seven meteorological indices for drought monitoring in Iran. Int J Climatol 27(15), 26 (7),):971–985. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1264
Morid S, Smakhtin V, Bagherzadeh K (2007) Drought forecasting using artificial neural networks and time series of drought indices. Int J Climatol 27(15):2103–2111. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1498
Mpelasoka FK, Hennessy R, Bates JB (2008) Comparison of suitable drought indices for climate change impacts assessment over Australia towards resource management. Int J Climatol 28(10):1283–1292
Ntale HK, Gan T (2003) Drought indices and their application to East Africa. Int J Climatol 23(11):1335–1357. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.931
Oladipo EO (1986) Spatial pattern of drought in the interior plains of North America. J Climatol 6(5):495–513. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.3370060505
Palmer W C (1965) Meteorological Drought, Research paper45, No. 45
Palmer WC (1968) Keeping track of crop moisture conditions nationwide: the new crop moisture index. Weather wise 21(4):156–161. https://doi.org/10.1080/00431672.1968.9932814
Pandey RP, Dash BB, Mishra SK, Singh R (2008) Study of indices for drought characterization in KBK districts in Orissa (India). Hydrol Process 22(12:1895–1907. https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.6774
Pashiardis S, Michaelides S (2008) Implementation of the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and the Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) for regional drought assessment: a case study for Cyprus. Eur Water 24:57–65
Patel NR, Chopra P, Dadhwal VK (2007) Analyzing spatial patterns of meteorological drought using standardized precipitation index. Meteorol Appl 14(4):329–336. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.33
Roudier P, Mahe G (2010) Study of water stress and droughts with indicators using daily data on the Bani River (Niger basin, Mali). Int J Climatol 30(11):1689–1705. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.2013
Seiler RA, Hayes M, Bressan L (2002) Using the standardized precipitation index for flood risk monitoring. Int J Climatol 22(11):1365–1376. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.799
Sen Z (1980) Regional drought and flood frequency analysis. J Hydrol 46(3–4):265–279. https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-1694(80)90080-3
Shafer BA, Dezman L E (1982) Development of a surface water supply index (SWSI) to assess the severity of drought conditions in snowpack runoff areas. Western Snow Conference, Reno, NV, 1 April, Colorado State University, USA
Smakhtin VU, Hughes DA (2007) Automated estimation and analyses of meteorological drought characteristics from monthly rainfall data. Environ Environ Model Softw 22(6):880–890. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2006.05.013
Tsakiris G (2004) Meteorological drought assessment. In: Paper prepared for the needs of the European Research Program MEDROPLAN (Mediterranean Drought Preparedness and Mitigation Planning), Zaragoza, Spain
Tsakiris G, Vangelis H (2004) Towards a drought watch system based on spatial SPI. Water Resour Manag 18(1):1–12. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:WARM.0000015410.47014.a4
Tsakiris G, Pangalou D, Vangelis H (2007) Regional drought assessment based on reconnaissance drought index (RDI). Water Resour Manag 2(5):821–833. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-006-9105-
Whipple W Jr (1966) Regional drought frequency analysis. J Irrig Drain Div Am Soc Civ Eng 92 (2):11–32
Wilhite D A (1987) The role of government in planning for drought: where do we go from here? In D. A. Wilhite and W. E. Easterling, eds. Planning for drought: toward a reduction of societal vulnerability; Chapter 25. West view Press, Boulder, Colorado, U. S. A.
Willeke G, Hosking J R M, Wallis J R, Guttmann N B (1994) The National Drought Atlas. Institute for Water Resources Rep. 94-NDS-4, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Wu H, Hayes MJ, Weiss A, Hu QI (2001) An evaluation of the standardized precipitation index, the China-Z Index and the statistical Z-Score. Int J Climatol 21(6):745–758. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.65
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Iran’s Meteorology Organization for its providing of monthly precipitation data of 41 synoptic stations for a 30-year time span.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Mahmoudi, P., Rigi, A. & Miri Kamak, M. A comparative study of precipitation-based drought indices with the aim of selecting the best index for drought monitoring in Iran. Theor Appl Climatol 137, 3123–3138 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-019-02778-z
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-019-02778-z