U.S. Drought Portal Website Launched

November 1, 2007 -- The government today unveiled a new Web site for the public and civic managers to monitor U.S. drought conditions, get forecasts, and know how drought impacts their communities or what mitigation measures exist. Called the U.S. Drought Portal, the www.drought.gov site was developed for the National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS). A seemingly slow and nomadic natural disaster threat, drought blankets about a third of the United States at any given time.

NIDIS is a collaboration between numerous federal agencies and several state governments to provide a dynamic and accessible drought-risk information system. NIDIS was created in response to extended drought conditions over the past decade, with strong advocacy from the Western Governors’ Association and other groups. NIDIS, led by NOAA, coordinates use of the U.S. Drought Portal for drought risk assessment and management among its federal, state, tribal and local partners.

NIDIS is intended to strengthen public and private sector partnerships, foster and support research, create an early warning system to detect drought and raise public awareness about why drought occurs and its impact on humans and nature. The goal of NIDIS is to improve the ability to understand and respond to climate change, natural disasters, and global environmental issues through better observation, data, analysis, models, and basic social science research.