Drought identification and analysis of precipitation trends in Beed District, Maharashtra

Abstract

Drought is a complex natural hazard with slow-onset and can occur over months or even years. Typically, a drought index is used to quantify the effect of drought which is based on various meteorological parameters, most importantly precipitation. However, the changing pattern of the rainfall is now a concerning issue and therefore, trend analysis of the precipitation data has become a vital part of the study, as it gives important information of the possibility of changes before prediction and analysis of natural hazards like drought. In the present study, spatial and temporal assessment of meteorological drought has been carried out for the Beed district of the Marathwada region, which is known as a drought-prone area in Maharashtra state. Initially, trend analysis of 34 years of precipitation data has been carried out using non-parametric tests Man-Kendall and Sen’s slope estimator. The beginning and end of the trend is determined using sequential Mann-Kendall test. Then, standardized precipitation index (SPI) values of different timescales (1, 3, 6, 9, and 12-monthly) were used to identify and analyze the drought events. The evaluation of the spatial distribution of the SPI over the region has been carried out using GIS. The results of trend analysis revealed that the East and West Beed region station shows non-significant decreasing trends while Central Beed shows a non-significant increasing trend for the monsoon season (June to September). The study has identified a total of six drought events (1985–86, 1987–88, 1992–93, 2001–02, 2005–06, and 2011–12) from 1979 to 2013. The results of the study show that Jamkhed, Ashti, Majalgaon, and Ambejogai are the most affected areas, whereas, Georai and Beed are the least affected during the drought events. The findings of present study will be helpful to gain a better understanding of the drought situation through in-depth trend analysis of precipitation, and assisting policymakers in developing a drought management plan to address the water related crisis.