Drought risk of summer maize in Huanghuaihai area, China.

Abstract

Drought is the greatest agro-meteorological disaster. Risk assessment of drought is of great guiding significance to improve the regional risk management and decision-making level, and to further reduce agricultural loss. In this paper, drought risk of summer maize was analyzed accor-ding to natural disaster risk theory, using the data of weather, planting area and yield of summer maize, and local effective irrigation area of 69 stations in Huanghuaihai area. The assessing indices and models of drought risk were established from the aspects of danger, vulnerability, exposure, and disaster prevention and mitigation capacity. The results showed that, in Huanghuaihai area, the most dangerous periods for drought during summer maize season (June-September) were the follo-wing two stages: sowing to emergence and milky to maturity. Spatially, the highest drought risk was mainly distributed in central and southern Hebei, western and northern Henan. After weighting the vulnerability, exposure, and disaster prevention and mitigation capacity, the integrated highest drought risk was mainly distributed in the west and southwest of Henan Province. The sub-high risk area was distributed in the south of Henan, Cangzhou and Xingtai of Hebei, and Dezhou of Shandong. The lowest risk area was located in south of Shandong, north of Anhui, and Xinyang of Henan. The other areas were at moderate risk.