Rainfall Distribution of 2014 (BRACED - 2016)

Data source: BRACED (Building Resilience to Climate Extremes and Disasters in South Sudan: An anthropological study exploring the perceptions of climate change, adaptation and resilience among agro-pastoral and agriculturalist communities in the Greater Bahr el Ghazal Region)

The climate of South Sudan is characteristically hot and dry, with seasonal rains brought on by the annual migration of the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone. Rain typically falls unevenly across the country; the northeast is drier and precipitation increases towards the southwest.

There is a wetter green belt along the southern border that includes western, central and eastern Equatoria, which has bimodal rainfall regimes from April to June and from August to October, enabling two or three harvests a year (BRACED, 2016). Annual rainfall in the green belt ranges from 800 mm to 2,500 mm (MOE, 2015). Rain in the rest of the country occurs between April and October. It is often heavy and continual, leading to beneficial seasonal floods that improve soil fertility, grass and pasture growth, and create fishing ponds (BRACED, 2016). Rainfall in the arid zone can be as low as 300 mm per year (MOE, 2015)

MOE. (2015). Fifth National Report to the Convention on Biological Diversity. Juba: Ministry of Environment (MOE), Republic of South Sudan. Retrieved here [https://www.cbd.int/doc/world/ss/ss-nr-05-en.pdf]