Chapter 3.1

Chapter 1 has focused on large climate anomalies that sometimes reach the size of continents and beyond. The present section offers a closer look at individual countries, including the 30 countries that together produce and commercialize 80 percent of maize, rice, wheat, and soybean. As evidenced by the data in this section, even countries of minor agricultural or geopolitical relevance are exposed to extreme conditions and deserve mentioning, particularly when they logically fit into larger patterns.

1. Overview of major agricultural countries

Several major cereal producers on all continents suffered from abnormally dry conditions over the reporting period, especially in Australia (RAIN 45% below average). In Europe, the reporting period (which corresponds with late dormancy and early vegetative growth of winter crops) was particularly dry in Germany (-33%), Poland and some Nordic and Baltic areas. In South Africa (-19%) the period corresponds to the final stages of late maize harvesting. In Canada (-18%) crop development is comparable to the European situation, but mostly less advanced. Finally, in Brazil (-16%), AMJJ corresponds to mid to late stages of summer crops and pre-planting of winter crops in the south, which are thus less likely to have been negatively affected. Rainfall was abundant for winter crops in Turkey (+37%) and possibly excessive in Argentina (+79%, with poor sunshine conditions) for the harvest of summer crops and the planting of winter wheat.

Cold “winter” temperatures affected Cambodia, Bangladesh and Thailand (around -1.4°C below average, with unfavorably low sunshine) where late stages of the second rice crop may have been affected. The coldest area among the major agricultural countries was Kazakhstan at 1.6°C; the planting of summer crops may have been delayed. Heatwave conditions affected much of Europe, with values in excess of 1.6°C above average in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Poland.  All those areas, as well as Ukraine, experienced above average sunshine.

Figure 3.1 represents countries in the plane of the two first principal components computed based on RAIN, TEMP, BIOMSS, RADPAR, CALF, and VCIx. The two first component (PC1 and PC2) accounts for 68% of the variance. PC1 is  positively correlated with RAIN (r=0.858) and BIOMSS (r=0.878) and negatively with RADPAR (r=-0.863). PC2 represents mainly CALF ( r=0.751) and VCIx (R=0.706). PC3 covers 18% of the variance and correlates best with TEMP (r=-0.665).

Data outside the concentration ellipse are deemed anomalous and include essentially ARG (point 1) with high RAIN and BIOMSS and low RADPAR, as well as low agronomic indices. EGY (8) comes next with high PC1 values but closer to average CALF and VCIx, while, at the other end of the scale, the group of  DEU (7) and  POL (22) had low rainfall and high RADPAR and nevertheless better CALF and VCIx. High agroclimatic indices occur in ZAF (31) while three countries had closer to average agroclimatic indices but low agronomic index values: IND (13), PAK (20) and UZB (29).  

2. Rainfall (RAIN indicator, Figure 3.2) and biomass accumulation potential (BIOMSS, Figure 3.3)

As already mentioned in chapter 1, the two indicators tend to follow very similar patterns, except where very unusual temperatures occur. Therefore, BIOMSS will not be specifically mentioned below, except where values markedly depart from RAIN.

2.1 Dry areas

The following discussion focuses on countries that experienced rainfall deficits in excess of 25%. Some of them (e.g. Botswana and Zimbabwe in southern Africa) do not raise any specific concern as they have now reached the end of their summer crop season.

The driest countries occur in Oceania and eastern South-east Asia, in particular, Timor Leste (-75%: 75 mm when the average reaches 260 mm), Australia (-45%), New Caledonia (-40%) and New Zealand (-38%).  All of them except New Zealand are also characterized by above average sunshine. In the Caribbean, Dominica (-58%), Trinidad and Tobago (-51%) and the Dominican Republic (-42%) low precipitation was accompanied by low temperature with departures in excess of 1°C. Paraguay (-41%) and Chile (-30%) had the lowest rainfall at the national level in Latin America.

One of most spectacular deficits affects an area that has rarely been prone to very abnormal weather in recent years, i.e. northern central Europe, centred around Germany (-33%) and including Denmark (-48%), Sweden (-45%), the Netherlands (-44%), Belgium (-30%) , Latvia (-29%) and Finland (-28%). The whole area also experienced above average temperature ranging from +1.5°C in Latvia and as much as +3.4°C in Sweden. Not only: the area experienced positive sunshine departures between 8% (Latvia) and 12% (Sweden and Denmark). The conditions triggered early growth after overwintering, but under unfavorable moisture supply and higher than usual water demand owing to the high temperatures and sunshine.

In Asia, both east and west had some rainfall deficit areas at the national level, including the Korean Peninsula (-34% in the Korean DPR and the Korean Republic); in the west Georgia and Turkmenistan recorded a deficit of -33%, Afghanistan was at -30% and Azerbaijan at -26%. Several of the countries also had abnormal values for other indicators. Georgia is singled out because it followed the same pattern as the above mention “German group” with warm weather (+1.5°C) and abundant sunshine.

2.2 Wet areas

Positive Rainfall anomalies in excess of 50% occurred in limited and spatially coherent areas that were mentioned repeatedly in CropWatch bulletins since the feature appeared several years ago. The anomaly, which is very climate-change compatible, affects the normally hyper-arid and semi-arid area from west Africa to central Asia. It was mentioned in Chapter 1. Excess rainfall occurred in the long list of countries in the Arabian peninsula, the Horn of Africa and the western Mediterranean. The record occurred in Oman where the AMJJ average amounts to 25 mm, but the current reporting period recorded 161 mm, equivalent to 554% increase.  Other countries include Kuwait (+217%), Israel (+113%), Jordan (+142%), Iraq (+95%),Syria (+90%), Lebanon (+88%), Somalia (+77%), Saudi Arabia (+64%), Macedonia (+64%), Qatar (+63%), Yemen (+56%), Greece (+53%) and Libya (+50%). The countries experience mild positive or negative temperature anomalies but all had below average sunshine in the range from of -6% (Iraq, Kuwait, and Qatar) to -2% (Libya and Yemen). In Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, and Oman the biomass potential (BIOMSS) increases are significantly lower than the corresponding rainfall anomaly because BIOMSS response to rainfall reaches saturation and because of low temperature. Many of the listed countries practice ground-water irrigation but others, especially in the Mediterranean area, derive water from rivers, which benefited from the abundant moisture.

Eastern and Southern Africa also had some regions with abundant precipitation, although of a lesser magnitude. The countries include Mozambique (+61%), Namibia and Malawi (+53%), and Tanzania (+50%). While the three first have now reached the end of their summer maize season, rangeland will benefit from the late-season rainfall. Tanzania has more complex cropping patterns due to latitude and relief, and rainfall will benefit food production.

Two more, unrelated, countries need to be mentioned: (1) Mauritania, where the recorded amount of 335 mm exceeds the average by 71%, thereby providing an early start to the summer rainy season. Other Sahelian countries also benefited from an unusually early start of the season (Niger, +30%; North Sudan +23%); (2) Argentina, where the nationwide departure (+79%) hides a spatially complex situation described later in this chapter.

3. Temperature (TEMP, Figure 3.4)

3.1 Cool areas

Several of the countries that experienced negative temperature departures in excess of 1.5°C were already mentioned among the areas that recorded large rainfall amounts, in particular, Mauritania (-1.9°C), Somalia (-1.5°C) and Kazakhstan (-1.6°C). Note, however, that the precipitation excess in the last country was only 10%.

All the countries listed in this group has below average sunshine, but they do not follow any clear spatial pattern. The lowest temperature anomaly occurred in French Guyana (-2.6°C and -10% RADPAR), followed by Morocco (-2.3°C and -8% RADPAR), Eswatini in southern Africa (-1.6°C) and Nepal (-1.5°C).

3.2 Warmer than average areas

The countries to be mentioned almost exclusively confined to western Europe. In fact, among 24 countries where the temperature anomaly exceeds 1.0°C, only one (Angola, +1.7°C) is not European. The highest values (between +2.0°C and +3.4°C) are those of Denmark, Belgium, Luxembourg, Finland, Norway, and Sweden.

4. Radiation or sunshine (RADPAR, Figure 3.5)

The largest national sunshine deficits do not, again, follow any clear geographic pattern, although three of eight countries with very large deficits of 10% and more do occur in Africa: Sao Tome and Principe (-14%), Burkina Faso and Sierra Leone, both at -10%. Four countries of the group are located in central and South America (Guyana -13%, Uruguay -12%, French Guiana -10% and Suriname 10%). This leaves Portugal (-11%) in a somewhat isolated position as the country is characterized by average values of the other agroclimatic indicators.

The highest positive departures all belong in the already mentioned group of European countries with low rainfall and high temperature. The three largest departures are observed in the Netherlands (+10%), Denmark and Sweden (Both at +12%).

Figure 3.1: Countries in the plane of the two first principal components. 1 ARG, 2 AUS, 7 DEU, 8 EGY, 13 IND, 20 PAK, 22 POL, 29 UZB, 31 ZAF. The green concentration ellipse includes 90% of data.

Figure 3.2: Global map of rainfall anomally (as indicated by the RAIN indicator) by country and sub-national areas, departure from 15YA

Figure 3.3: Global map of biomass anomally (as indicated by the BIOMSS indicator) by country and sub-national areas, departure from 5YA

Figure 3.4: Global map of temperature anomally (as indicated by the TEMP indicator) by country and sub-national areas, departure from 15YA

Figure 3.5: Global map of PAR anomally (as indicated by the RADPAR indicator) by country and sub-national areas, departure from 15YA