The Meteorological Service of Jamaica is reporting that 11 parishes recorded rainfall amounts below their 30-year climatological average in June.

Principal Director, Evan Thompson, said at the end of June, St Elizabeth, St James, St Ann and St Mary were determined to be experiencing drought conditions.

“Manchester and St Catherine were both basically on the borderline, in that they were just about moving towards drought conditions, so it’s most likely that having not experienced significant rainfall during the month of July, that situation would have worsened,” Thompson explained.

He was addressing a media conference on Jamaica’s drought conditions, at the Ministry of Water, Environment and Climate Change, in Kingston on Thursday, July 30. 

Thompson shared that July is usually the month with the least amount of rainfall climatologically and is considered the mid-summer drought month.

He advised that one of the main reasons for the dry conditions is the El Niño phenomenon, which is associated with climate variability.

“The El Niño actually was generated in June, at the early part of June, and we see that it has continued to get stronger and stronger going through July, and this is expected to continue that trend,” he said.

Thompson shared that El Niño is projected to strengthen through to the end of the year and into the first quarter of next year.

“The strength of the event is proportional to the probability of unusual and extreme weather impacts, including higher temperatures and fewer rainfall occurrences. It doesn’t mean we will have no rainfall. It just means that the number of incidents of rainfall will be fewer. However, we could have a bout of rainfall that is intense, and so we could have very small areas that experience even flooding events…as these systems develop and as they continue to affect us. But generally, we will experience dry conditions,” he detailed.

Meanwhile, Thompson said the rainfall projections for August to October are expected to be below normal, with probabilities ranging from 40 per cent to 50 per cent in parts of most parishes.

He shared that rainfall probabilities of 50 per cent and higher are forecast for parts of St Elizabeth, Manchester and Clarendon, St Catherine, Kingston and St Andrew, as well as eastern parts of St Thomas and Portland and border areas of St James and Trelawny.

For the next three months, above-normal temperatures are forecast for western and central parishes.

Eastern parishes are also likely to experience temperatures above normal, although there is lower certainty.