Human progress and drought sensitivity behavior

Abstract

Objectives: Human progress is the satisfaction of human needs associated with life quality, social and economic justice. Considering that climate had significant effect on socio-economic behavior of Earth populations, the objective of this work was to evaluate the relationship between human progress and drought sensitivity behavior in Minas Gerais State, Brazil.

Methods: The human progress variable was generated by principal component analysis, considering the factors: Territorial occupation of the population, dependency ratio, urbanization degree, income, habitation, health, education, sanitation, security and human development index. The moisture index product was generated based on map algebra calculation in GIS, using WorldClim precipitation and MODIS evapotranspiration products. Nonlinear least squares method and Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm fit an exponential model to the moisture index (independent) and human progress (dependent) variables. Covariance and crossed-covariance functions were used to characterize the structure and magnitude of spatial dependence between the human progress and the moisture index co-variable.

Results: Couple modeling human progress and moisture index variability generated the human drought sensitivity behavior variable, representing the effects of regional climate in Homo sapiens population. The generated human drought sensitivity behavior values were inverted, i.e. lower and higher human drought sensitivity behavior values indicated higher and lower human sensitivity to drought, respectively. Adaptive management capacity with more capable governments combining economic and engineering solutions to maximize species, habitat, ecosystem survival and resilience, could generate best mitigation solutions to reduce potential impacts of climatic spatial variation in Minas Gerais state, Brazil.