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La cuenca del río Conchos:
una mirada desde las ciencias ante el cambio climático
North American Drought Monitor
. In 2002, drought experts from
the U.S., México and Canada began the production of a monthly
drought status monitor for North America (Lawrimore
et al.,
2002). The NADM authors use multiple objective drought indices
and indicators, supplemented by input from regional and local
contributors. Every two years, one of the countries hosts a workshop,
focusing on addressing the needs of NADM users, improving
the quality of the NADM, and improving communication to
decision makers. The RGB Pilot work on the North American
Drought Monitor is focused on enhancing the usability of the
NADM at regional scales, and developing transboundary regional
Drought Early Warning Systems
(DEWS), including warning for
río Conchos stakeholders, concerned with water for agriculture,
ecosystem health, and international treaty obligations. Thus far,
much effort has been devoted to improving drought definitions
and compiling an inventory of drought indices as the basis for a
drought toolkit. In addition, the partners have concentrated on
communication and coordination to improve the timely delivery
of monthly drought assessments. Most of the efforts have focused
on national-level web-based assessment of the regional use of the
NADM (Muth
et al.,
, 2017).
At the national level, partners aim to enhance research efforts
to improve short and long-term drought prediction through
sharing of practices, which would aid in regional preparedness.
A known limitation of the NADM, based on evaluations of
the U.S. contribution (the U.S. Drought Monitor; Svoboda
et al.,
,
2002), is that a single map is used to portray drought status and
impacts for a variety of different sectors and stakeholder needs.
Mexican partners have expressed interest in tailoring drought
monitor products designed for specific sectors and users. Experts
attending a 2016 NADM workshop recommended that relevant
partners work to develop and evaluate high-resolution blended
drought products for water managers. To improve assessment
