Daily precipitation changes in the semi-arid region over northern China

The semi-arid area in northern China is an agro-pastoral transition zone. The environment there is sensitive to climate variation, particularly to precipitation change. Daily precipitation records of 30-gauge stations from May to September during 1956–2000 are analysed in this study. The precipitation amounts show only slightly decreasing trends; however, some aspects of the rainfall characteristics display significant changes. Compared to the 1950s, rainy days have been reduced by about 8 days in the 1990s. Significant change is observed in the number of days when there is light rain (<10 mm day⁻¹). The days with light rain also show a significant tendency toward a stronger intensity, whereas those days with moderate and above moderate rains do not. At the same time, the long duration precipitation (3days) event is found to decrease remarkably with a linear trend of −5.6% per 10 years. In contrast, the frequency of long dry spells (10 consecutive days without rainfall) is becoming more frequent at a rate of 7.2% per 10 years. Taking 30 stations as a whole the maximum daily rainfall displays no evident trend. But the median of the maximums shows a step-like drop beginning in 1979 and the low values are notable until the early 1990s. This is coincident with the large-scale climate regime shift over East Asia, probably suggesting a response of regional daily precipitation extremes due to the change of the East Asian summer monsoon system.