Catherine Pizani

 REGIONAL ASSESSMENT OF PAST DROUGHT & FLOOD EPISODES AND THEIR MANAGEMENT IN SELECTED SWIM-SM PCs (TUNISIA, JORDAN AND PALESTINE) Work package (WP1) Water Governance and Mainstreaming Activity 1.3.3.1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY February 2014 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Despite the lack of consistent data in terms of temporal and spatial resolution and extent, the regional assessment shows that most of the drought episodes occurred during the last three decades and are becoming more persistent involving multiple years of consecutive droughts. Available studies of the standardized precipitation index (SPI) over the last century for the east Mediterranean indicates that the entire region, has negative trends of annual SPI and precipitation, while countries like Jordan, Lebanon and Palestine; happen to be most affected by the decrease. Likewise, review of national reports for the southern Mediterranean countries point to the same conclusion. All countries also report increased incidences of flood events with dramatic economic, social and environmental consequences, especially in the Western PCs. However lack of sufficiently long records on floods in addition to their incompleteness, does not allow depicting any discernable trends. On the other hand, the national communication reports to the United Nations Framework for Climate Change (UNFCC) confirm that climate change is one of the drivers for the extreme phenomena in the PCs including increased intensity and severity of droughts. Table 1 presents the highlights of the review of drought and flood episodes for each country; Algeria (DZ), Egypt (EG), Israel (IL), Jordan (JO), Lebanon (LB), Morocco (MO), Palestine (PA) and Tunisia (TN). Although Libya is among the Partner Countries, however no information is readily available on-line to enable assessing drought and flood characteristics in the country. Table 1: Summary of the review of the drought and flood episodes in the PCs and potential linkage to Climate Change Drought Flood Potential Linkage to CC DZ Intense and persistent drought during the past 25 years (rainfall deficit around 30% across the country. Western Part most hit by drought (rainfall deficit >50%) Most of the floods occur in the north -), particularly in the centre and north east regions. The most frequent flood events are of S11, M2>4. Floods of higher severity and/or magnitude have also been observed during the past decade Increased temperature by 0.5oC during the period- compared to the preceding 30 years, including decreased precipitation by 10% and marked increase in floods EG Egypt's vulnerability to drought is confined where rain-fed agriculture is practiced in the north west, for which drought frequency has been increasing (after 1957) Most of the floods recorded between 1990 and 2009 occurred in the south particularly in the southeast areas and the southern part of Sinai. The Most frequent flood events are of S1, M>4 Increased severity of extreme events and increased rainfall trend over the Mediterranean coast with a mean trend of +0.76 mm/year when considering the period-, However, the long term precipitation analysis for the period-shows increased drought frequency.