Assessing the Scale of High-Intensity (Extreme) Rainfall and Its Impact on Dutch Potato Yields

Abstract The frequency of high-intensity (extreme) rainfall is expected to increase due to climate change. At local-scale impact on potato yields can be large, with great effects on farmers’ income. If the event occurs at a larger scale, affecting many farms in the same region at the same time, then also the processing industry is affected, causing rising prices and costly reshuffling of supply chains. Previous studies showed a prolonged dry summer and a prolonged wet autumn are large-scale weather extremes causing large yield losses, not only at farm scale but also at provincial and national level. For high-intensity (extreme) rainfall the scale of the events and the scale of the impact was to date unclear. Previous studies showed large impacts on Dutch potato yields at field and farm scale. The current study shows in the past 31 years in 12 Dutch provinces high-intensity (extreme) rainfall occurred only at a local scale, causing strong local effects (previous studies) but no large scale yield anomalies (this study).