Precipitation and Temperature Anomaly in North-East of Iran and its Impact on Rainfed Wheat Productivity

Climate variability is the most effective parameter on crop productivity especially rainfed crops.in this study, the anomaly index was calculated for meteorological elements such as maximum temperature(T max), minimum temperature(T min), precipitation(P) and crop yield(Y) for Razavi Khorasan province in Iran, which is located in arid and semi arid region of the world. Precipitation Anomaly Percentage (PAP) is a traditional drought monitoring index, it shows the precipitation as a percentage of the long-term average or normal Thepurpose of this study is finding significant relation between various indexes such as yearly precipitation anomaly (PA) with yearly maximum temperature anomaly(T max A) and yearly minimum temperature anomaly(T min A) for the period (1989-2005).At first, moving average of 5, years old,were examined for 10 stations. In addition, yearly precipitation anomaly, probability and return period of it were calculated using sigmoidfunction. Pearson correlation was examined to find relationship between change percent of yearly precipitation anomaly(PAP), yearly minimum(TminAP), maximum temperature anomaly(TmaxAP) and yearly rainfed crop yield anomaly of wheat (YAP). Multiple linear regression was calculate between YAP (as dependent parameter) and climate variability(indpendent parameter). Sarakhs, Ghuchan and Mashhad had significant correlation (P <0.05) 0.63,0.55 and 0.54 respectively. In other station, no relation found between PAP and YAP. A significant relation between TmaxAP and YAP was obtained in Mashhad (P < 0.05, r= -0.48) and TminAP and YAP was found only in Ghuchan(r=0.56).