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East Asian monsoon
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The East Asian monsoon is a monsoonal flow that carries moist air from South Asia to East Asia. It affects approximately one-third of the global population, and the countries of the China, Japan, North Korea, and South Korea. It is driven by temperature differences between the Asian continent and the Pacific Ocean.
In most years, the monsoonal flow shifts in a very predictable pattern, winds being southwesterly in late June to water the Korean peninsula and Japan. This leads to a reliable precipitation spike in July and August. However, this pattern occasionally fails, leading to drought and crop failure. In the winter, the winds are northeasterly and the monsoonal precipation bands move back to the south, watering southern China and Taiwan.
The East Asian monsoon is known as jangma in Korea, and as tsuyu in Japan.
There has been some speculation that climate change will disrupt or change the monsoonal pattern.