Drought and Water Scarcity: Monitoring, Modelling and Mitigation

Dear Colleagues,

It is well known that water scarcity and droughts constitute a specific scientific field of hydrology and water resources, which is currently receiving significant attention mainly due to climate change, among other reasons. Similarly, at present, technological and scientific advances, such as modelling, integrated water resources management systems, geoinformatics, remote sensing and GIS, as well as computational developments, show steadily increasing reliability and new systems possibilities occur every year with continuously improving capabilities.

The problem of water scarcity affects several parts of the world. Specifically, in semi-arid and arid regions, such as the Mediterranean region, this problem becomes of major concern. Indeed, water scarcity currently consists of the adverse result of ineffective water resources management and policies, as well as the availability of insufficient water in these regions. The ineffective water resources management and the lack of water availability analysis, along with the presence of prolonged drought periods caused by increased climate variability and possibly climate change, as well as the water overuse and misuse and the addition of new water demands lead to water scarcity. As already mentioned, extended drought periods is one of the factors and components leading to water scarcity. Indeed, drought is a natural phenomenon recurring at a regional scale throughout history. Drought is also considered as one of the major natural hazards with significant impact to environment, society, agriculture and economy. It is recognized that there is no universally accepted definition of drought, since there is a wide variety of sectors affected by drought and due to its diverse spatial and temporal distribution. Moreover, there are several special drought features, such as its non-structural effects, or its slow onset, or even the lack of a universal consideration of drought as a hazard. In addition, there are severe impacts of droughts, which are also indirect and not easily measured. This is why there are so many difficulties in drought assessment and response, which may cause delays or lack of progress on drought preparedness plans, or even mitigation measures.

The aim of this Special Issue is to foster scientific and technological advances in the field of water scarcity and droughts for a range of practical applications and research investigations.

Such contributions can be focused on various aspects, including, but not limited to, active and passive remote sensing data and methods (e.g., satellites, weather radar, SAR, UAV, sensors), applications in drought hazards affecting agriculture, water scarcity simulation and modeling, decision support systems, climate change: impact-mitigation-adaptation, agroclimatic classification, software tool development for data collection and processing, as well as their applications.

Prof. Nicholas Dercas
Guest Editor

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