Question

describe rainfall trends for Zimbabwe from 1901 t0 2009

Answer 1

Answer:

In this paper the generalized extreme value distribution is fitted to the mean annual rainfall to describe the extremes of rainfall. Extreme value theory (EVT) is used to estimate the probabilities of meteorological floods. The maxima distribution is used to fit the generalized extreme value distribution to the data and find probabilities of extreme high levels of mean annual rainfall. Anderson-Darling goodness of fit test shows that the simpler generalized extreme value model of the Gumbel distribution provides a good fit. We explore the possibility of trends in the data. Results indicate that there are no such trends. The yearly mean return level estimates are derived and return level of 1193mm (recorded high mean annual rainfall amount) is associated with a mean return period of approximately 300 years. This paper provides the first application of extreme value distributions to mean annual rainfall from a drought prone country such as Zimbabwe.