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Two Sides to Same Drought: Measurement and Impact of Ethiopia’s 2015 Historical Drought

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  • Thomas Pave Sohnesen

    (World Bank)

Abstract

Climate change is likely to lead to more frequent and more severe droughts with risk of socio-economic suffering. Utilization of satellite data, available almost instantaneously, is a great tool now providing the backbone of drought monitoring. However, the measurement of drought for socio-economic impact is poorly understood, questioning our ability to deal efficiently with future challenges. This study showcases the challenge by estimating the impact of Ethiopia’s historical 2015 drought, reported to be the worst in five decades, according to different drought indicators. The analysis shows a sever meteorological and self-reported drought, with substantially less rainfall than average and a high share of households reporting drought exposure. Also, more than half of the rural households reported lower consumption in 2016 than two years prior, despite large amounts of food aid were distributed in response to the drought. There are, however, no or limited signs of an agricultural drought, based on vegetation indices and predicted crop losses. Agricultural production, price, and wage data also support 2015 being a normal agricultural year. Further, based on spatial rank correlation, none of the different drought indicators (self-reported, vegetation anomalies, predicted crop losses, or rain anomalies) provide a coherent story of where the drought was worst. In fact, across years the spatial rank correlation between drought indicators shifts sign, highlighting that the inconsistent information on drought from different indicators is not restricted to 2015. In terms of drought impact on consumption, no impact, on average, is found for rain anomalies, predicted crop losses, or vegetation anomalies in the growing season, while a large impact is found for self-reported drought exposure and a smaller impact for vegetation anomalies in the harvest season. The self-reported drought exposure is not a trustworthy drought indicator due to endogeneity, while the impact from vegetation anomalies in the harvest season seems driven by better than average, as opposed to worse than average, vegetation. With indicators showing two such different sides to the same drought and limited spatial correlation between them, the case study calls for more research on the suitability of these indicators, and care and robustness checks when utilizing drought indicators to understand socio-economic impact.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Pave Sohnesen, 2020. "Two Sides to Same Drought: Measurement and Impact of Ethiopia’s 2015 Historical Drought," Economics of Disasters and Climate Change, Springer, vol. 4(1), pages 83-101, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:ediscc:v:4:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1007_s41885-019-00048-w
    DOI: 10.1007/s41885-019-00048-w
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    2. Dang, Hai-Anh H & Hallegatte, Stephane & Trinh, Trong-Anh, 2023. "Does Global Warming Worsen Poverty and Inequality? An Updated Review," IZA Discussion Papers 16570, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
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    4. Thomas Pave Sohnesen & Peter Fisker & David Malmgren‐Hansen, 2022. "Using Satellite Data to Guide Urban Poverty Reduction," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 68(S2), pages 282-294, December.
    5. Markhof,Yannick Valentin & Ponzini,Giulia & Wollburg,Philip Randolph, 2022. "Measuring Disaster Crop Production Losses Using Survey Microdata : Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9968, The World Bank.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Drought measurement; Impact assessment; Drought emergency response;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • O13 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Agriculture; Natural Resources; Environment; Other Primary Products
    • Q1 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture
    • R28 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Government Policy

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