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Arid Land Geography ›› 2025, Vol. 48 ›› Issue (11): 1903-1912.doi: 10.12118/j.issn.1000-6060.2024.729

• Climate Change • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Spatiotemporal characteristics of drought in Inner Mongolia based on GEE and optimal remote sensing drought index

CHEN Xianlin1(), YAN Zhiyuan1(), LIU Quanming1,2, LI Ruiping1, ZHANG Shengwei1,2,3   

  1. 1. College of Water Conservancy and Civil Engineering, Inner Mongolia Agricultural University, Hohhot 010018, Inner Mongolia, China
    2. Autonomous Region Collaborative Innovation Center for Integrated Management of Water Resources and Water Environment in the Inner Mongolia Reaches of the Yellow River, Hohhot 010018, Inner Mongolia, China
    3. Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Key Laboratory of Water Resources Protection and Utilization, Hohhot 010018, Inner Mongolia, China
  • Received:2024-12-05 Revised:2025-01-03 Online:2025-11-25 Published:2025-11-26
  • Contact: YAN Zhiyuan E-mail:chenxl@emails.imau.edu.cn;yanzy@imau.edu.cn

Abstract:

The scientific revelation of the spatiotemporal characteristics of agricultural drought through remote sensing cloud computing technology is of great significance for promoting ecological civilization and the sustainable development of agriculture and animal husbandry. Taking the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China as the study area, and based on Google Earth Engine (GEE), various remote sensing drought indices from 1982 to 2021 were constructed using multi-source remote sensing and meteorological data. The representation capabilities of the normalized vegetation supply water index, crop water stress index (CWSI), temperature-vegetation drought index, vegetation condition index, and temperature condition index for agricultural drought were compared, and the spatiotemporal variation of drought in Inner Mongolia from 1982 to 2021 was analyzed. The results show that: (1) CWSI exhibits significantly better representation ability for agricultural drought than the other four indices. (2) The CWSI from 1982 to 2021 shows a general downward trend, with areas of insignificant change accounting for 77.5%, extremely significant decline accounting for 9.4%, and significant increase also accounting for 9.4%. (3) Drought severity gradually decreases from west to northeast. Among the drought categories, moderate drought accounts for the highest proportion (77.55%), followed by severe drought (26.38%) and extreme drought (23.07%); light drought and no-drought areas are the smallest, accounting for 18.35% and 2.95%, respectively. The correlation between CWSI and the annual average standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index differs significantly across climate types. Cold grassland climate, hot-summer winter-dry cold-temperate climate, and warm-summer winter-dry cold-temperate climate show an extremely significant negative correlation (P<0.01), while correlations in other climate types are not significant. These findings provide theoretical support and a decision-making basis for agricultural production and drought early warning in Inner Mongolia.

Key words: remote sensing, drought index, crop water shortage index (CWSI), Google Earth Engine, Inner Mongolia