Abstract. As an essential component of drought risk, crop–drought
vulnerability refers to the degree of the adverse response of a crop to a
drought event. Different drought intensities and environments can cause
significant differences in crop yield losses. Therefore, quantifying drought
vulnerability and then identifying its spatial characteristics will help
understand vulnerability and develop risk-reduction strategies. We select
the European winter wheat growing area as the study area and 0.5∘ × 0.5∘ grids as the basic assessment units. Winter wheat
drought vulnerability curves are established based on the
erosion–productivity impact calculator model simulation. Their loss change
and loss extent characteristics are quantitatively analysed by the key
points and cumulative loss rate, respectively, and are then synthetically
identified via K-means clustering. The results show the following. (1) The
regional yield loss rate starts to rapidly increase from 0.13 when the
drought index reaches 0.18 and then converts to a relatively stable stage
with the value of 0.74 when the drought index reaches 0.66. (2) In contrast
to the Pod Plain, the stage transitions of the vulnerability curve lags
behind in the southern mountain area, indicating a stronger tolerance to
drought. (3) According to the loss characteristics during the initial,
development, and attenuation stages, the vulnerability curves can be divided
into five clusters, namely low-low-low, low-low-medium,
medium-medium-medium, high-high-high, and low-medium-high loss types,
corresponding to the spatial distribution from low latitude to high latitude
and from mountain to plain. The paper provides ideas for the study of the
impact of environment on vulnerability and for the possible application of
vulnerability curve in the context of climate change.