Stant. Due to its robustness and convenience, SPI has currently been widely applied to characterize dry and wet conditions in a lot of countries within the Mediterranean area, for instance Turkey [22,23], Spain [24,25], Italy [260], Iran [313], Greece [346], Iraq [379], and Palestine [40]. In particular, quite a few researchers in North Africa have studied meteorological drought using SPI indices, like in Algeria [415], in Morocco [46], and in Tunisia [479]. So far, there has not been a study on spatial and temporal variations of meteorological drought, expressed by SPI, in the region of the Wadi Mina basin of northwest Algeria, which is characterized by higher intensities of agriculture and presence of forest cover. As outlined by [50], renewable water resources in Algeria are quite low and can be approximated as 19 billion cubic meters per year. Inside the other words, the water sources are equal 450 cubic meters (m3 ) per capita per year and are slightly below the 500 m3 per capita per year that’s encouraged because the scarcity threshold indicating a water crisis. Furthermore, the water resources have high variability and projections are that rainfall could lower by additional thanWater 2021, 13, x FOR PEER REVIEW3 PK 11195 Purity & Documentation ofWater 2021, 13,Additionally, the water sources have higher variability and projections are that 3rainfall of 26 could reduce by additional than 20 by 2050, which would lead to greatly worsening water shortages in unique basins of Algeria [51]. Expertise on intense dry situations can also be crucial simply because these can influence not merely on water scarcity for agriculture 20 by 2050, which would result in significantly worsening water shortages in distinctive basins but in addition on natural ecosystems, mostly forest inside the case of the studied basin. For examof Algeria [51]. Understanding on intense dry situations can also be essential because these ple, Mensah et al. [52] showed that elevated temperatures will further exacerbate the can influence not merely on water scarcity for agriculture but also on all-natural ecosystems, drought forest in the case of ecosystemsbasin. As an example, Mensah et al. [52] showedsmaller impacts on forest the studied at web pages with precipitation levels equal or that mainly than the atmospheric evaporative exacerbate the drought impacts on forest ecosystems defielevated temperatures will additional demand and sturdy influence of vapor stress at cits onwith precipitation levels equal or smaller than in soil moisture. evaporative demand sites carbon uptake, and can worsen the decline the atmospheric In this influence of vapor was to far better characterize uptake, and drought patterns and strongwork, the objective pressure deficits on carbon annual-scale can worsen the over the in soil Mina basin in an effort to help water resource arranging. The primary objectives decline Wadi moisture. are to In this perform, the objective was to better characterize the basin for the duration of 1970010, (2) (1) map traits of drought patterns over annual-scale drought patterns over the Wadi Mina basin in an effort to or in drought qualities, (three) identify drought identify any trends in precipitation aid water resource planning. The main objectives are to (1) map qualities of drought patterns more than the basin through 1970010, (2) identify years more than the (Z)-Semaxanib Protein Tyrosine Kinase/RTK observation period, and (4) estimate the return periods for severe drought any trends in precipitation or in drought characteristics, (3) determine drought years over the across the basin.observation period, and (four) estimate the retur.