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Drought Causes Impacts and Management Strategies

The document discusses drought, defining it as a prolonged scarcity of water resources, and highlights its prevalence in India, affecting 25-30% of the population. It categorizes drought into meteorological, hydrological, and agricultural types, detailing their causes, impacts, and management strategies. The authors emphasize the need for effective soil management practices and water conservation to mitigate the adverse effects of drought on agriculture and food security.

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20 views4 pages

Drought Causes Impacts and Management Strategies

The document discusses drought, defining it as a prolonged scarcity of water resources, and highlights its prevalence in India, affecting 25-30% of the population. It categorizes drought into meteorological, hydrological, and agricultural types, detailing their causes, impacts, and management strategies. The authors emphasize the need for effective soil management practices and water conservation to mitigate the adverse effects of drought on agriculture and food security.

Uploaded by

nicholauselias75
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Vol.

2 Issue-3, NOV 2021 (e-ISSN: 2582-8223)

Drought: Causes, Impacts and Management Strategies


Deepak Singh1*, Nisha Singh2, Devideen Yadav1 and Sujeet Desai3
1
ICAR-Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India
2
Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna Garhwal University (A Central University),
Srinagar (Garhwal), Uttarakhand, India
3
ICAR- Central Coastal Agricultural Research Institute, Goa, India

ARTICLE ID: 033

Drought
It is very difficult to define drought because it is often used in more than one context.
But in simple words, drought is defined as the scarcity of water resources for a longer time
duration at a place where it appears unusual than the normal condition. On an average 25 to
30 % of the Indian population is affected by one or the other form of drought.
Drought is the conditional term, as the same amount of rainfall in a particular area
may be considered as a drought but in another place, it may be considered as no drought
(normal). This is because of the distribution of water resources on the earth's surface. As we
know that some places receive very little precipitation whereas some places receive plenty of
precipitation which continuously replenishes the available water source structures such as
ponds, lagoons, lakes, rivers, and groundwater aquifers. Therefore, a place receiving less
rainfall goes without rainfall for a couple of weeks but available plants, animals, and people
experience a few problems whereas, high rainfall region with the same amount of dryness can
be experienced as a more severe drought.
In a short duration, people don’t consider drought as a natural disaster like other
natural catastrophes (Hurricane, flood etc.) because these natural calamities become
devastating in a very short period, whereas, drought doesn’t affect much if occurred for a
couple of weeks. However, if the drought occurs for the longer duration, it would be more
devastating than the Hurricane and floods.
Different types of drought
Drought is categorized based on certain conditions and indicators which help the planner
(government agencies) release or provide the necessary relief resources to the drought-
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affected places. Based on this, drought is classified into three main types:
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i. Meteorological drought:
www.justagriculture.in
Vol.2 Issue-3, NOV 2021 (e-ISSN: 2582-8223)

It is defined as a situation when there is more than a 25 % decrease in the


precipitation than the normal values over an area. As per the Indian Meteorological
Department, meteorological drought is again divided into sub-groups based on the
deficiency in the precipitation.
a. Moderate drought-
It is defined as the seasonal deficiency which varies between 26 to 50 %.
b. Severe drought-
This type of drought occurres when the deficiency level is more than 50 % of
the normal value.
Based on the above condition, drought year would be considered if an area
records any kind of drought alone or collectively more than 20 % of the total country
area.
ii. Hydrological drought:
Hydrological drought occurs if the meteorological drought persists for a
longer duration and results in depletion of surface water resources which leads to
drying of the rivers, stream, ponds and tanks etc.
iii. Agricultural drought:
The principal criteria of this drought is the deficiency in rainfall amount. It is
defined as the decline in the soil moisture effectively and leads to water deficiency in
the plants and land aridization. Agricultural drought can be specified through the
aridity index (A) which is defined as-

𝑃𝐸𝑇 − 𝐴𝐸𝑇
𝐴= × 100
𝑃𝐸𝑇
Where, PET- potential evapotranspiration
AET- actual evapotranspiration
If the values of aridity index is zero, it is considered as no drought and as it approaches to the
higher values it represents severe drought.
Causes of drought
There are several factors responsible for drought:
a. Uncertainty and lack of rainfall
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b. Faulty agricultural practices

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Vol.2 Issue-3, NOV 2021 (e-ISSN: 2582-8223)

c. Delay in onset or early termination of monsoon


d. Change in cropping pattern
e. Use of flood irrigation methods
f. Deforestation
g. Lack of water conservation structures
h. Climate change
Impact of drought
Drought impacts every aspect of life such as economic, environmental and social
component. Following are the ill effects of drought:
a. No crop production and or decline in the yield based on drought condition
b. Lack of availability of the seed material for the next season
c. Leads to desertification
d. Excessive dependency on groundwater for irrigation and expentidure for withdrawal
Drought lowers the soil quality by affecting the breakdown process of organic matter.
e. Health and quality of water bodies such as rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, wetlands are
affected
Management of drought
Like any other natural disaster such as hurricane, storm, and flood it is difficult to predict
the occurance and termination of drought. But with pre-planned strategies and adopting
water-saving technologies, the impact of drought can be minimized. . Following are some of
the strategies:
a. Educating the people regarding the importance of water in their life.
b. Adopting high water use efficient irrigation technologies
c. Selection of Less water demanding crops
d. Creating water conservation and storage structures
e. Adopting conservation agriculture practices
f. Creating awareness to stop pollution
g. Promoting organic farming by use of farmyard manure, compost, concentrated
organic manure in agriculture
h. Adopting mulching in the agricultural field to enhance crop production and moisture
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conservation.

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Vol.2 Issue-3, NOV 2021 (e-ISSN: 2582-8223)

Essence
In the developing country like India where the economy is mainly dependent on the
agriculture, occurance of drought can severly affects the agricultural production and food
security. Therefore, there is an urgent need to tackle with this natural calamity. In order to
overcome the adverse impact of drought, adoption of proper soil management practices like
mulching, conservational tillage, use of organic manures, green manure, compost, and sheep
penning can lead to an enhanced agricultural production in the affected areas. These
management practices are not only economically viable but are also environmentally
sustainable as they result in improved soil health and agricultural production.

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