The fourth assessment report of the IPCC highlights that the global average surface
temperature is projected to increase by 1.8 to 4.0 by the year 2100 compared to current ℃
climate. Given that climate is the most important driver of the hydrological cycle, the rise in
temperature could cause changes in occurrence patterns of extreme hydrologic events like
streamflow droughts. An increase in frequency and severity of these events could pose serious
challenges for sustainable management of water resources particular in arid regions.
However, the understanding of water resources dynamics and the possible impacts of climate
change on these dynamics is hindered by uncertainties in climate change models and complex
hydrological responses of streams and catchments to climatic changes. Therefore observational
evidence of streamflow dynamics at the local scale could play a crucial role in
addressing these uncertainties and achieving a fuller reconciliation between model-based
scenarios and ground truth. This paper determines spatial and temporal changes in streamflow
volumes and their association with climatic factors based on the non-parametric
Mann–Kendall test and ANOVA to determine possible changes in streamflow over the years
and their relation to climatic factors. Streamflow is generally stochastic highlighting the importance
of factoring in temporal flow variability in water resources planning. There is no clear
evidence that changes in climatic variables are related to streamflow behaviour.