Hydroclimate variations in the Northern China Plain and their possible socio-cultural influences

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Northern China Plain is China’s traditional and important agricultural production base, where climate change in the past has significantly affected China in many aspects such as national agricultural policies, ecological construction and foreign trade exchanges. High-resolution paleoclimatology research reveals that the precipitation, relative humidity, and drought index in this area have a significantly variability in the past few centuries, and spectral analysis shows that each time series has an obviously short period coinciding with the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) cycle. In this study, we summarized that ENSO signals in hydroclimate variations of northern China are probably from the Indian water vapor partly. In addition, the possible impact of hydroclimate variations in northern China on social and cultural events are briefly discussed considering historical records.