Estimating Seasonal and Interannual Variations in Precipitation in Rural Eastern Africa: A Case Study in Longido, Tanzania
Abstract
Access to water is a limiting factor for development in many semi-arid regions, contributing to food insecurity and environmental stresses on the local population. Additionally, some rural areas still have limited quantitative data on weather and associated rainfall patterns. This study analyzes ground meteorological data from a station installed at Longido, Tanzania and performs time series decomposition modelling of complementary Integrated Multi-satellite Retrievals (IMERG) data to quantify the amount, distribution, and variability of this essential resource. The seasonal rainfall pattern at Longido is bimodal with a large peak between March and May and a smaller peak between October and November. Interannual variability in rainfall is only weakly correlated with El Niño and the Indian Ocean Dipole indices; however, the highest observed rainfall does occur in a year with numerous simultaneous storms in the southern Indian Ocean. This analysis will help improve water management planning in the locality and points to a need to promote and support water storage as a method to meet the needs of the local population
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