PRECIPITATION AND TEMPERATURE CHANGES IN SLOVAKIA DURING THE GROWING SEASON IN 1961-2020.

The impact of climate change is felt by people all over the world, but this change is more pronounced in Europe. In Slovakia, which is in Central Europe, we feel these changes in all areas of the economy, but most significantly in agriculture. We experience extremely high temperatures more and more often, and frequent periods of drought alternate with extreme intensity of precipitation. The aim of this paper is to compare these changes in temperature and precipitation with a reference period - the sixty-year climate normal (1961-2020). Based on data from 81 meteorological stations, maps of temperature and precipitation deviations from the climatic norm were created by interpolation for selected decades (1961-1970, 1991-2000 and 2011-2020) in the growing season (April - October). By overlaying the map outputs of temperature and precipitation, new attributes were created that comprehensively evaluate locations in Slovakia. The results show that in the 1960s the summer months were normal in terms of precipitation and subnormal in temperature, in the 1990s the areas were mostly normal in temperature and in April especially above normal in terms of precipitation. On the contrary, the last decade is characterized by above-normal temperatures throughout the entire period and belownormal precipitation at the beginning of the growing season and above-normal precipitation in the autumn months. With this contribution, we can help farmers visualize the development of temperatures and precipitation, and thus they will be able to better adapt to the development of climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]