The United States Drought Monitor is a collection of measures that allows experts to assess droughts in the United States. The monitor is not an agency but a partnership between the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the United States Department of Agriculture, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Different experts provide their best judgment to outline a single map every week that shows droughts throughout the United States. The effort started in 1999 as a federal, state, and academic partnership, growing out of an initiative by the Western Governors Association to provide timely and understandable scientific information on water supply and drought for policymakers.