The gauge based grid precipitation product is obtained from the Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC), which is available via the internet (URL: http://gpcc.dwd.de). The GPCC dataset is a near real-time monthly analysis. The data product is combined with the Monitoring Product based on internationally exchanged meteorological data and monthly precipitation data delivered by national agencies or other institutes from 173 countries. The temporal coverage of gauges is roughly 30,000 gauges worldwide. The average gauge-density is about 2 gauges per 1x1 degree grid box. The data are combined with precipitation estimates based on various satellite estimates to produce the Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) satellite-gauge combined datasets (Rudolf et al., 1994). In this project, we explore only 10 years of data from 1993 to 2002.