Indicators of Dry Spells and Distribution of Rain in Ceará and the Impacts on Rainfed Agriculture

Abstract

Northeastern Brazil has marked interannual rainfall variability with some dry and other rainy years. In this region, there are dry spells, which are consecutive days with no rainfall during the rainy season, causing losses in agricultural crops. This article aims to use an indicator of Indian summers already established by other authors 2020 and identify its relationship with the Rain Distribution Index and regionalize according to the state's macro-regions, as well as understand the possible consequences, in a qualitative and quantitative way. on crop losses in Ceará. The study area comprised the state of Ceará and the analyzes were carried out for the period from 1980 to 2018. From the IBGE yield data, the losses of corn and beans crops were calculated, and through the results it can be inferred that: the correlations made with data on crop losses, summer and the IDC showed that for the largest part of the state there is a direct correlation, that is, the higher the frequency of summer events, the greater the crop loss. In addition, it was found that when there is a better distribution of precipitation over the regions of the state, less crop loss occurs.

Keywords
indicator; precipitation; crop; dry spells