Abstract
The study was undertaken to investigate the magnitude, frequency and trends of drought incidence in North Wello Zone, northeast Ethiopia using monthly rainfall record for the period 1987 to 2017 of Meket and Wadla station. Standard precipitation index and Mann–Kendal test were used to analyse drought event and trends of drought occurrences, respectively. Drought Index Calculator used to analyse standard precipitation index. The coefficient variation of the study area for Meket was (21.2%), while for Wadla it was (53%) which showed high inter-annual variability. It was established that both studied stations experienced drought episodes in 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2006, 2014 and 2015, drought years in the history of Ethiopia. The year 2006 was the most severe and distinct-wide extreme drought episode in both studied stations which standard precipitation index values -2.14 at Wadla and -2.01 at Meket station. The frequency of drought number of years which experienced negative standardize precipitation index values in the total time series of 30 years observed for all time scale at both station is 50 percent and above. The drought magnitude of different time scale varied from slight to extreme severe in the studied stations. The Mann–Kendal trend test shows except two-month timescale at Wadla station, all timescales were not statistically significant (P<0.05). Generally increasing tendencies of drought were observed during main rainy season and decreasing tendencies of drought during short rainy season and annual scale observed in the study area.
Climate-based crop pattern determination using Standard Precipitation Index (SPI) and the Oldeman classification in Sangiran Site
