Author(s)

G. Chinwendu Okafor^1*, O. D. Jimoh², K. Isaac Larbi³

¹Faculty of Civil Engineering, Kwameh Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.
²College of Civil Engineering, Federal University of Science and Technology, Minna, Nigeria.
³Department of Hydrology, University of Abomey-Calavi, Cotonou, Benin.

This study aimed to detect trends in the long-term hydro-climatic series using non-parametric methods. The annual and seasonal linear trends of rainfall, temperature, runoff, water level and evaporation were analysed for stations in downstream Kaduna River Basin during 1975-2014. The non-parametric Mann-Kendall and Sen’s estimator of slope procedures were adopted to identify if there exists an increasing or decreasing trend with their statistical significance at 95% level of confidence. The datasets were checked to account for auto-correlation prior to determining trends using Mann-Kendall test. The existence of abrupt changes was detected by means of Cumulative Sum Charts and Bootstrapping analysis. The results of study indicated increasing trends for seasonal and annual temperature and runoff series. Water level and evaporation revealed statistically decreasing trends both on annual and seasonal periods. However, for the period 1975 to 2014 no significant distinctive trend was observed for rainfall at the investigated stations. Change-points in time series were identified in all the investigated hydro-climatic records for the sub-basin. Generally, the detection of the trend for hydro-climatic variables by Mann-Kendall test conforms to Sen’s test results. It is concluded that the basin is sensitive to climate variability and water stress impacts which will affect food security. So, it would be necessary to make adjustments in the adaptive water-use strategies being adopted at present in the catchment.

Hydro-Climatic Variables, Kaduna River, Trend Analysis, Mann-Kendall Test, Theil-Sen’s Slope Estimator

Okafor, G. , Jimoh, O. and Larbi, K. (2017) Detecting Changes in Hydro-Climatic Variables during the Last Four Decades (1975-2014) on Downstream Kaduna River Catchment, Nigeria. Atmospheric and Climate Sciences, 7, 161-175. doi: 10.4236/acs.2017.72012.