Gridded, monthly rainfall and temperature climatology for El Niño Southern Oscillation impacts in the United States

Abstract

This article introduces a web‐based climate information resource: an El Niño Southern Oscillation ENSO‐based monthly climatology for the United States, available on http://AgroClimate.org. Climate variability affects land managers and decision makers in a variety of ways. The ENSO is one of the leading drivers of seasonal and year‐to‐year climate variability. Understanding the historical rainfall and temperature anomalies associated with ENSO can be an important way for decision makers to learn how they might anticipate climate variability. We used the ENSO record from 1950 to 2013 to develop an ENSO‐specific climatology. This allows decision makers to pinpoint the combinations of location and month in which there are substantial ENSO‐associated rainfall or temperature anomalies. Learning about the timing of historical ENSO‐driven climate impacts can be an important first step for decision makers to develop management adjustments that could make the most positive outcomes based on the available climate information.

Role of Modelling in International Crop Research: Overview and Some Case Studies

“…Crop simulation models can effectively account for the yield and growth effects of the interaction of environment with crop management (E × M), assuming fixed G effects. One example is the AgroClimate program run by the University of Florida [267], which provides farmers with strategic advice regarding which crop to plant as a function of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation patterns. Probabilistic distribution of: (a) rice equivalent yield (REY), (b) irrigation, and (c) evapotranspiration of a rice-wheat system and maize-wheat system in central Punjab, India over 40 years .…”

“…Crop simulation models can effectively account for the yield and growth effects of the interaction of environment with crop management (E × M), assuming fixed G effects. One example is the AgroClimate program run by the University of Florida [267], which provides farmers with strategic advice regarding which crop to plant as a function of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation patterns. Another example is Yield Prophet ® , a web-based service that provides field-specific yield forecasts to optimize the investments of approximately 900 farmers, based on the Agricultural Production Systems sIMulator (APSIM) model, one of the major used crop models in agricultural systems [268].…”