Disasa et al. (2025) Comprehensive review of drought characteristics and intensification under climate change: implications for agriculture and water resources

Identification

• Journal: Journal of Hydrology
• Year: 2025
• Date: 2025-11-08
• Authors: Kinde Negessa Disasa, Haofang Yan, Jianyun Zhang, Guoqing Wang, Chuan Zhang, Desheng Zhang, Biyu Wang, Beibei Hao
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.134571

Research Groups

• Research Centre of Fluid Machinery Engineering and Technology, Jiangsu University, China.
• State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering, Nanjing Hydraulic Research Institute, China.
• School of Agricultural Equipment Engineering, Jiangsu University, China.
• School of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Geography Science, Ningbo University, China.

Short Summary

This review synthesizes the intensification of drought characteristics across meteorological, hydrological, and agricultural sectors under climate change. It highlights how global warming alters drought frequency and severity, leading to significant risks for water resources and crop yields.

Objective

• To evaluate the conceptual definitions and evolving characteristics (frequency, duration, intensity, and severity) of various drought types—meteorological, hydrological, agricultural, and socioeconomic—and their specific implications for global water resources and agriculture under climate change.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Global (analysis of 34 major river basins) with regional focus on China (including the Yangtze River Basin, Yellow River Basin, and Huaibei Plain).
• Temporal Scale: Historical analysis (1901–2021) and future projections (2015–2100).

Methodology and Data

• Models used: General Circulation Models (GCMs) utilizing Bias-Corrected Spatial Disaggregation (BCSD).
• Data sources: Literature review of historical observations and future climate projections under Shared Socioeconomic Pathway scenarios (SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, and SSP5-8.5).

Main Results

• Meteorological Trends: Between 1901 and 2021, 47% of 34 global river basins experienced meteorological droughts across more than half of their total area.
• Yangtze River Basin Projections (2025–2100): Projections indicate a decrease in drought frequency (20.57%), duration (78.69%), and severity (81.36%) across most of the basin, excluding the source and lower reaches.
• Yellow River Basin Projections (2015–2100): While the frequency of hydrological droughts is projected to decrease by 15.50%, the severity is expected to increase by 14.40%.
• Agricultural Impact: Drought stress during critical growth stages (flowering and grain filling) significantly impacts productivity; specifically, soybean yield reductions of up to 82% were identified on the Huaibei Plain when drought occurs during flowering.
• Drought Propagation: Climate change is intensifying the transition from meteorological deficits to hydrological and agricultural droughts, altering crop water requirements and increasing pest/disease proliferation.

Contributions

• Provides a comprehensive multi-sectoral synthesis of drought propagation and its regional variability.
• Quantifies the divergent responses of major river basins to climate change, distinguishing between decreasing frequency and increasing severity in specific hydrological contexts.
• Highlights the extreme vulnerability of specific crop phenological stages to drought-induced yield loss.

Funding

• Not explicitly detailed in the provided text (Article part of the special issue ‘River Basin Ecohydrological Processes’ in the Journal of Hydrology).

Citation

@article{Disasa2025Comprehensive,
  author = {Disasa, Kinde Negessa and Yan, Haofang and Zhang, Jianyun and Wang, Guoqing and Zhang, Chuan and Zhang, Desheng and Wang, Biyu and Hao, Beibei},
  title = {Comprehensive review of drought characteristics and intensification under climate change: implications for agriculture and water resources},
  journal = {Journal of Hydrology},
  year = {2025},
  doi = {10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.134571},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.134571}
}

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