The purpose of this study was to examine the pattern of annual drought variation using the standardized vegetation health index (SVHI) in the central highlands, Vietnam. The time-series imagery of daily MODIS products during the 2001-2020 period were used to compute land surface temperature and normalized difference vegetation index that are two primary parameters of the applied drought index. Besides, the standardized precipitation index (SPI), derived from 5 meteorological stations, was

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... d to validate the SVHI. Furthermore, the spatial regression approach was used to analyze the spatiotemporal variation of annual drought intensity in the study area. The results showed that the correlation coefficient between SVHI and SPI upon 5 stations was found out at average level above with the significance of 95% (r > 0,5, p < 0,05). Additionally, the severe drought category seriously influenced in 2005 and 2006 and these years were concurrent with El Niño event. Moreover, an increasing trend in drought patterns focused on agricultural land, while a decreasing trend was explored at forest land upon whole provinces. The results from this study enables providing a useful reference to local governments for proposing strategies of reducing drought risk and forest protection.