VALID VisuALIzing Drought: know deeper to face better
Drought is one of the water-related hazards has caused more deaths in the globe in the last century (approx 12 million, 1900–2004). Moreover, only after flood, drought affected more people globally than others (drought ~35% and flood ~50% of global population). Contrary to what is thought, in Europe the economic losses were greater than in the rest of the continents for the same period, according to the International Disaster Database (EM-DAT). In addition, drought is a phenomenon that causes further problems of welfare and food globally.
Researches, including the №1006 document of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), indicate that monitoring may help to reduce the impacts of drought. Thus, in the agenda of water-related SDGs 6.A and 11.5 have to be stressed the improvement of drought monitoring to better design of the prevention and mitigation strategies.
With the aim to reduce the number of deaths and the number of affected people by drought, drought monitoring can be improved modifying three aspects of it: indicators, models and visualization tools. For technical experts, the stress is in the three aspects, but for decision makers, stakeholders and the general public, it is important the visualization of drought. VALID (VisuALIzing Drought) encompasses approaches and tools to analyse and communicate drought-related information in an effective and creative manner.
