doi: 10.18178/ijesd.2020.11.3.1236
Climate Change Effects on Drought in Sharjah, UAE
Abdullah Gokhan Yilmaz1
, , , , ,
Serter Atabay4
- 1University of Sharjah, Australia
- 2University of Sharjah, Iraq
- 3University of Sharjah, United
- 4American University of Sharjah, United Kingdom
Abstract
Drought is a natural phenomenon that occurs dueto low precipitation conditions. Under the effect of climatechange, frequency and magnitude of drought events areaggravated. Drought has negative effects on various fields suchas agriculture, environment, ecosystems, economy and society.In this study, drought conditions in Sharjah, United ArabEmirates, were assessed by monthly Rainfall Anomaly Index(RAI) and Aridity Index (AI) using observed and future(projected) rainfall data. Following calculation of the indexvalues, temporal trends were investigated using non-parametricMann-Kendal trend test. Trend results showed mostlystatistically non-significant trends in Sharjah. Only decreasingtrends in March was statistically significant for observed RAIvalues and projected (future) RAI values derived from rainfalldata using global climate models including GISS_E2_H,GISS_E2_R and MRI_CGCM3. This study is an outcome ofinitial stage of a comprehensive drought assessment project,and provides useful information for policymakers in Sharjah,UAE.
Keywords
- Climate change
- drought
- RAI
- AI
- Sharjah
- United Arab Emirates
How to Cite
Abdullah Gokhan Yilmaz, Arwa Najah, Aysha Hussein, Athra Khamis, Naseraldin Kayemah, and Serter Atabay, "Climate Change Effects on Drought in Sharjah, UAE," International Journal of Environmental Science and Development, vol. 11, no. 3, pp. 116-122, 2020. https://doi.org/10.18178/ijesd.2020.11.3.1236
Copyright & License
Copyright © 2020 by the authors. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited (CC BY 4.0).