Sub-Saharan rainfall 1981-84.

Abstract

A number of studies have documented the steady decrease of rainfall which occurred from the 1950s to the early 1970s in the West African Sahel (Tanaka et al, 1975; Bunting et al, 1976; Kraus, 1977; Kidson, 1977; Nicholson, 1979; Lamb, 1978). The intense drought, which began around 1968 was generally thought to have ended in the mid-1970s but updates of earlier studies (Nicholson, 1982, 1983; Lamb, 1982, 1983) clearly established that it had not. A flurry of recent press reports has further indicated continuation and probably intensification of the drought situation in West Africa. In this note, the magnitude and spatial distribution of rainfall deficits since 1981 are described and compared with fluctuations prior to that time.-from Author