Since October 2020, large parts of Eastern Africa have been experiencing extended dry conditions followed by short intense rainfall events that often led to flash floods.
The drought has led to substantial harvest failure, poor pasture conditions, livestock losses, decreased surface water availability and human conflicts.
The below-average rainfall seen in the final quarter of 2022 continued a pattern that had been recurring since 2020.
A group of international climate scientists with World Weather Attribution (WWA) collaborated to assess to what extent human-induced climate change altered the likelihood and intensity of the low rainfall that led to drought, as well as the increase in evaporation due to climate change.
The team analysed rainfall over the most impacted region - covering parts of southern Ethiopia, southern Somalia and eastern Kenya - for 24 consecutive months from January 2021 to December 2022, as well as the 2022 March-May and October...