Evaluation of TRMM 3B42 V7 Rainfall Product over the Oum Er Rbia Watershed in Morocco

In arid and semi-arid areas, rainfall is often characterized by a strong spatial and temporal variability. These environmental factors, combined with the sparsity of the measurement networks in developing countries, constitute real constraints for water resources management. In recent years, several spatial rainfall measurement sources have become available, such as TRMM data (Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission). In this study, the TRMM 3B42 Version 7 product was evaluated using rain gauges measurements from 19 stations in the Oum-Er-Bia (OER) basin located in the center of Morocco. The relevance of the TRMM product was tested by direct comparison with observations at different time scales (daily, monthly, and annual) between 1998 and 2010. Results show that the satellite product provides poor estimations of rainfall at the daily time scale giving an average Pearson correlation coefficient (r) of 0.2 and average Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) of 10 mm. However, the accuracy of TRMM rainfall is improved when temporally averaged to monthly time scale (r of 0.8 and RMSE of 28 mm) or annual time scale (r of 0.71 and RMSE of 157 mm). Moreover, improved correlation with observed data was obtained for data spatially averaged at the watershed scale. Therefore, at the monthly and annual time scales, TRMM data can be a useful source of rainfall data for water resources monitoring and management in ungauged basins in semi-arid regions.