The influence of climate change on freshwater availability in the Sokoto Rima River Basin, Northwestern Nigeria.

Abstract

This research entailed the acquisition of long-term (1980-2020) meteorological data (rainfall, temperature, and runoff) which was used to compute the values for the mean annual, monthly, and seasonal hydro-climate variables to establish their trend and behavior. To substantiate if the patterns of runoff are in any way due to the changing climate, the meteorological data were subjected to non-parametric tests-Mann-Kendall (MK), Sen's slope estimator, Kendall tau, and partial correlation. MK trend test for runoff, rainfall, and temperature (on an annual and seasonal basis) revealed significant trends on an annual scale. Nevertheless, rainfall data did not exhibit any, observable trend on a seasonal scale. On both annual and seasonal scales, temperature values showed increasing trends. In the entire period considered (1980-2020), runoff also exhibited a remarkable increase in trend. Sen's estimator values ranged from - 0.04 to 3.23. The results of the Kendall tau correlation showed that runoff is positively correlated to rainfall (tau = 0.222), with a high confidence level (95%). Again, the partial correlation analysis of runoff and climatic variables for annual and seasonal timescale, results show that the runoff is significantly (rxy.z = 0.315) affected by both rainfall and temperature. It is therefore recommended that future research should utilize robust input-output models to determine the amount of water stress in the basin. As a sustainable management approach, artificial surface water reservoirs should be constructed to complement the available water from the Sokoto-Rima river and alleviate the water stress experienced by the population.