Characterization and socioeconomic impacts of the late 19th Century drought episodes in Catalonia (NE Iberian Peninsula)  

Abstract

Recent droughts in the Mediterranean region are increasing concerns on the current and future water resources availability in this region. For this reason, studying the most severe droughts of the recent past and their associated societal responses is key to better characterise the current drought episode ongoing in Catalonia since 2021, as well as to properly define future adaptation strategies. One of these episodes of great magnitude and significant impact on economic and social activity were the droughts that occurred in Catalonia (North-East of the Iberian Peninsula) during the last third of the 19th century (1860-1890). Here, we analyse these droughts using data obtained from administrative documentary sources and instrumental meteorological records. Administrative sources were obtained from local civil and ecclesiastical authorities of eight different locations, as well as from one large irrigation community (Urgell’s Channel Irrigator’s Guild, since 1862). These historical documentary sources provide qualitative information at a daily resolution about drought impacts on the society. Together with the historical data, we also analyse different instrumental precipitation series using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). This data provides a wider spatio-temporal perspective of drought behaviour for the entire Spanish territory during the study period. This study uses existing instrumental precipitation series for Spanish territory spanning from the mid-late 19th Century, with a total of 18 instrumental precipitation series obtained from INM (Spanish National Meteorology Institute). Additionally, we use 66 precipitation series in Spain obtained from the AEMET (Spanish Agency for Meteorology). This joint use of historical and instrumental data allows us to perform a spatio-temporal clustering of drought events to contextualize the intensity and persistence of the severe droughts occurring from1860 to 1890 in Catalonia. Finally, we complete the analysis of drought episodes examining their social impact, we also explore statistical data (Spanish State Statistical Year Books) from economic activities and other social variables.