![]() ![]() This study provides a first skill evaluation of global seasonal ET 0 forecasts for their potential use in food insecurity assessments by FEWS NET. 2014), in providing improved skill relative to precipitation for seasonal drought predictions across the United States (especially during the summer growing season in the central and northeastern United States). (2016b) demonstrated the potential of seasonal forecasts of ET 0 anomalies from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Climate Forecast System, version 2 (CFSv2 Saha et al. 2016a), which is based on ET 0 and exploits the land–atmosphere interactions found between AET and ET 0, has been shown to provide early warning of drought conditions. For example, the evaporative demand drought index ( Hobbins et al. ![]() This effort is timely in that recent studies have highlighted the value of ET 0 for drought monitoring and forecasting. To fill this gap, FEWS NET has recently invested in building reference evapotranspiration (ET 0 Allen et al. Precipitation, as important as it is for agroclimatological conditions, only reflects one side of the crop water balance, the other one being actual evapotranspiration (AET-the flux of the moisture from the cropped surface to the atmosphere), which is also influenced by evaporative demand (the demand in the atmosphere for AET).įEWS NET currently provides scenarios of crop-yield conditions that are based on the expected precipitation scenarios but only the climatological mean values of evaporative demand, which therefore do not account for evaporative demand’s 1) interannual variability and 2) potential long-term changes due to global warming. For early warning, however, FEWS NET’s primary focus has so far been on the precipitation forecasts for the upcoming season. 2010), and FEWS NET Land Data Assimilation System ( McNally et al. 2014) and modeling sources, such as Climate Hazards Group InfraRed Precipitation with Station ( Funk et al. Agroclimatology-the condition of climate and agriculture-is one of the four primary dimensions of food insecurity assessments, along with livelihoods, markets and trade, and nutrition.įor agroclimatological monitoring, FEWS NET uses several datasets ( ) from remotely sensed ( Brown et al. The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) is a leading provider of early warning and analysis on acute food insecurity ( ) to help government decision-makers and relief agencies plan for and respond to humanitarian crises in 36 of the most food-insecure countries, mainly located in Africa, Central America, and central Asia. A case study over parts of East Africa for the JJA season shows that ET 0 forecasts in combination with the precipitation forecasts would have provided early warning of recent severe drought events (e.g., in 2002, 2004, 2009) that contributed to substantial food insecurity in the region. The FEWS NET regions where forecasts are most skillful (correlation > 0.35 at lead 3) include northern sub-Saharan Africa (DJF dry season), Central America (DJF dry season), parts of East Africa (JJA wet season), southern Africa (JJA dry season), and central Asia (MAM wet season). Globally, the regions where forecasts are most skillful (correlation > 0.35 at leads of 2 months) include the western United States, northern parts of South America, parts of the Sahel region, and southern Africa. The results indicate that ET 0 forecasts are a promising tool for early warning of drought and food insecurity. The skill evaluation, using deterministic and probabilistic scores, focuses on the December–February (DJF), March–May (MAM), June–August (JJA), and September–November seasons. The ET 0 reforecasts span the 1982–2009 period and are calculated following the American Society for Civil Engineers formulation of the Penman–Monteith method driven by seasonal climate forecasts of monthly mean temperature, humidity, wind speed, and solar radiation from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction CFSv2 model and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration GEOS-5 model. This study describes development of a new global reference evapotranspiration (ET 0) seasonal reforecast and skill evaluation with a particular emphasis on the potential use of this dataset by FEWS NET to support food insecurity early warning. The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) team provides food insecurity outlooks for several developing countries in Africa, central Asia, and Central America.
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