Reducing drought risk: Bridging theory and practice

Drought events across the United States since 1995 illustrate the country's continuing vulnerability to drought. Officials are beginning to recognize the need for enhanced mitigation actions to reduce the increasing economic, environmental, and social impacts of droughts. One way to better understand a region's drought vulnerability and identify the appropriate mitigation actions to take is to conduct a drought risk analysis. However, drought risk can be a confusing concept for many planners. For this reason, a simplified, flexible framework for conducting a drought risk analysis is presented. This framework is based on a combination of natural hazards theory and interactions with a variety of drought planners in the field, and is intended to be a practical, action-oriented model to assist drought planners on a variety of political and geographic scales. Several case studies are also discussed to demonstrate the application of such a model.