Fostering drought research and science-policy interfacing: Achievements of the DROUGHT-R&SPI project

The DROUGHT-R&SPI project adopted a transdisciplinary approach that combined drought analyses for six selected Case Studies across Europe with drought analyses at the pan-European scale both for past and future climates. Achievements on drought as natural hazard, drought impacts, responses and science-policy interfacing are reported. These include the European Drought Reference (EDR) database that consolidates information about historical large-scale drought events and the first pan-European Drought Impact report Inventory (EDII) database that was populated with reports of thousands of impacts that occurred in Europe. More detailed outcome on historic and future droughts were obtained both for Europe and the six Case Studies, including both economic and environmental impacts, evaluation of past and future possible practices to cope with drought, vulnerability and drought risk. The results from the Case Studies show that there is no "one size fits all" solution for drought policy, risk reduction as well as management. This confirms the follow-up proposed in the "Blueprint to safeguard Europe's waters". The Case Study Dialogue Fora and the pan-European Dialogue Forum showed that drought management strategies have to be context-specific, cost-effective, and at the same time should protect ecosystem services. Successful science-policy interfaces only can develop over time, if based on specific circumstances and drought characteristics.