Assessment of Agricultural Drought Risk in the Lancang-Mekong Region, South East Asia.

Lei Zhang,Wei Song,Wen Song

doi:10.3390/ijerph17176153

Abstract

Natural disasters worldwide regularly impact on human activities. As a frequently occurring natural disaster, drought has adverse impacts on agricultural production. The Lancang-Mekong River is a transnational river running through China and five Southeast Asian countries and it is a vital water resource for irrigation in the region. Drought in the Lancang-Mekong Region (LMR) has occurred frequently in recent years. Assessing the risk of drought in the region is essential for rational planning of agricultural production and formulation of drought relief measures. In this study, an assessment of drought risk has been achieved by combining the hazard and vulnerability assessments for drought. The assessment of the drought hazard depends mainly on the standardized precipitation index (SPI). The assessment of drought vulnerability takes into account various indicators such as climatic factors (e.g., crop water stress index), soil factors (e.g., available water capacity), and irrigation factors (e.g., irrigation support). The results reveal that: (1) Drought distribution in the LMR is characterized by a spreading of the drought to countries along the middle and lower reaches of the Mekong River. Countries located in the middle and lower reaches of the Mekong River are more prone to drought. Laos, Thailand, and Cambodia are the regions with higher and high-drought risk levels. (2) The spatial distributions for the drought hazard and the drought vulnerability in the LMR exhibit significant differences as evidenced in the mapping results. High-hazard and high-vulnerability areas are mainly distributed in the middle LMR, and the middle to higher hazard areas and the middle to higher vulnerability areas are mainly distributed in the south-central LMR, while the low-hazard areas and the low-vulnerability areas are mainly in the north. (3) The majority of planting areas for sugarcane, rice, and cassava are located in the high-hazard areas. The distributions of drought-prone and high-hazard areas also correspond to the main agricultural areas in the LMR.

Highlights

For many years, natural disasters throughout the world have regularly caused serious impacts to life and societies [1,2]
High-hazard and high-vulnerability areas are mainly distributed in the middle Lancang-Mekong Region (LMR), and the middle to higher hazard areas and the middle to higher vulnerability areas are mainly distributed in the south-central LMR, while the low-hazard areas and the low-vulnerability areas are mainly in the north
Spatial superposition calculations were performed using the results for drought hazard Spatial and superposition calculations were performed using the results forwas drought hazard assessment assessment the vulnerability assessment

Summary

Introduction

Natural disasters throughout the world have regularly caused serious impacts to life and societies [1,2]. Natural disasters often result in the loss of natural and social resources [3,4]. Intensity, and space–time distribution of disasters, the risks and losses caused by natural disasters may be different [5,6,7]. The occurrence of natural disasters is inevitable, they can be reasonably anticipated by studying their nature and historical data in order to provide for possible early warning, effective monitoring, and prevention [4,8]. Scientific assessment of natural disaster risk, together with subjective judgement, can effectively strengthen the risk management and mitigation measures for disaster prevention. Public Health 2020, 17, 6153; doi:10.3390/ijerph17176153 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph

Methods

Results

Conclusion