High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Drought Research Initiative(DRI) was established to better understand the physical characteristics of and processes influencing Canadian Prairie droughts, and to contribute to their better prediction, through a focus on the recent severe drought that began in 1999 and largely ended in 2005. It is an interdisciplinary effort that involves 15 funded investigators from 6 Canadian universities and more than 20 collaborators from other universities and federal laboratories as well as partners from three provincial governments (Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan). DRI is achieving its objective by focusing on five complementary research themes, including quantification, understanding, prediction, comparisons with other droughts, and implications for society. Details beyond the scope of this entry can be found in Stewart et al. (2008) or on the DRI website