ClimDev-Africa Initiative

Joseph D. Intsiful, Senior Climate Science Expert African Climate Policy Centre, UNECA

SADC Regional Climate Information Services Workshop

Victoria Falls Zimbabwe, 29Nov -2 Dec 2016

Content

Background and perspective

ClimDev-Africa CIS work – Result Area I

Climate Research for Development in Africa (CR4D) initiative

Summary, conclusion and outlook

Background and perspective

Sustainable attainment of poverty reduction and other Development Goals in Africa through policies and decisions on practices in Africa that take full account of climate change risks and opportunities at all levels

ClimDev-Africa Vision

4

Relevance of ClimDev-Africa

• Unique in that it brings climate information and development together

• Conceptually relevant – integrates pillars of sustainable development • Reinforces Africa’s development agenda • Political buy-in at the highest level – endorsed by heads of states • Combination of partners’ strengths:

– UNECA to generate knowledge and analytical inputs to inform policy;

– AfDB to demonstrate return on investments in climate information in order to optimize new investments in CIS;

– AUC to enable policy formulation and uptake at the highest level

5

ClimDev-Africa Programme is structured into Three

Result Areas

Climdev-Africa Programme

Management and Functioning

Result Area 2

Quality Analysis for Decision Support and Management Practice

Result Area 3 Informed Decision-Making, Awareness

and Advocacy

Result Area 1

Widely Available Climate Information,

Packaging and Dissemination

6

ClimDev-Africa CIS Work (Result Area I): Widely Available Climate Information, Packaging and Dissemination

Season to year Next hour to 10 days Decade Long term climate change

Short to medium

term weather

forecasts

Eg tropical cyclone,

storm surge, flood

Probabilistic seasonal

to inter annual

forecast eg:

probabilities of

severity and intensity

of extreme events

Decadal climate

trend analysis

Climate

change

scenarios

emergency planning

activation and response Eg: evacuation

Long-term strategic

planning

Infrastructure

development

Land use zoning and

planning

Building codes

Urban & coastal areas

seasonal preparation

of Stocking of

constrution materials Adaptation planning

Local and national

emergency service

Governmental authorities

Public

Urban planners

Local to national govt

Banks

Companies

Legislators

US

ER

S

AP

PL

ICA

TIO

N

SE

RV

ICE

Local and national

emergency service

Construction companies

Food suppliers

Climate Information Services for Development Planning

Challenges to Delivery of Climate Information Services in Africa

• Over 88 % of NMHS are challenged in delivering climate information services to support DRR

• 92% lack appropriate application software • 96% need upgrading of operational infrastructure to support

DRR • 92% need technical training on production of climate products

and services • 85% say lack of effective co-ordination with other agencies

involved in DRR impacts negatively on operations • Significant investment required for effective delivery of CIS (at

least $6mil per country) • Very low capacity to assess economic utility of CIS

Support to countries:

• Analysis, design and implementation of national activities • Accessing, collecting and analyzing data on climate variability

and change and impacts • Build capacities of countries to establish and use e-

infrastructure (ICT, data, tools & network of institutions) to inform decision making

• Establish a community of practice to sustain the established systems

Implementation Strategy Towards an integrated and comprehensive approach

Technical support on CIS to pilot countries - Ethiopia, Rwanda and Gambia

• Support to Ethiopia, Rwanda and Gambia in data rescuing, upgrading hydro-

meteorological observational networks, early warning and data management systems.

• In Ethiopia, ACPC delivered 23 high capacity computers for the NMA, 20 Automatic

Water Level Recorders and remote telemetry units, 1 database management

software, and technical training was providing to experts from the Department of

Hydrology of the Ministry of Water and Energy

• In Rwanda, ACPC delivered hydro-meteorological equipment and is assisted in setting

up flood early warning systems in two watersheds, as well as 19 high performance

computers, 15 hard drive disks and 5 scanners, 1 high performance computer and 1

database server

• Also in Rwanda, ACPC has implementing a project on vulnerability and risk

assessment

• In The Gambia, ACPC delivered 4 water level measurement stations with telemetry, 3

ground water monitoring station with telemetry and a cellular base station are

procured and one system installed with remainder under installation.

• The ENACTS (Enhancing National Climate Services) initiative was implemented in

Rwanda and Gambia in partnership with IRI to meet the increasing demand for

improved climate information and services.

Flood early warning system in Gambia

Hydrological network in Ethiopia

Vulnerability index for Rwanda

Making climate information widely available Africa-wide with specific focus on African SIDS

Establishing a Helpdesk for technical support and services (resources and systems)

Establishment of a High Resolution Continental Numerical Weather Prediction and Early Warning System to address special needs on African SIDS

Capacity Building, Deployments and Direct Engineering Assistance on Wireless Communication Platforms for Climate Information and Climate Services Delivery in African SIDS

Establishing Climate Services Information Systems Africa-Wide to make climate information and services widely available

Plotter polls the Conductor for Tasks for generating weather plots

Modeler polls the Conductor for Tasks for running the weather model and notifies it on progress and completion.

GFS Fetcher downloads weather data from NOAA as it becomes available, converts it into a format suitable for the WRF-Chem weather model

The WOD system is built around a database, large file systems, the WRF-Chem atmospheric model and it’s utilities and services

Conductor manages resources of the WOD system.

Architecture of the Weather-on-Demand (WOD) Infrastructure: Numerical Weather Prediction & Early Warning System

African SIDS Implementation (wind and rainfall)

Guinea-Bissau Cabo Verde Sao Tome & Principe Seychelles Mauritius

Pan African Implementation (Accumulated rainfall)

http://uneca.belgingur.is/map/gnb.5-1.1.full/composite/2016-08-12T00:00+03:00

Comoros

Madagascar Implementation (Accumulated rainfall)

Major Implementations

Forecasting Hurricane Fred over Cabo Verde

Model forecasts Sal before and during the Hurricane

Harvesters

RDMS

Folders, Entries, Metadata,…

CRUD Search (federated) Access control Event notification …

Basic Services Web UI

APIs HTTP & FTP

File, image, chat,Wiki page, link, script, … DIF, THREDDS, …

HTML RSS Catalog OAI-PMH OPeNDAP KML …

Viewing

Output Handlers

RAMADDA Publishing

HTML

RSS

Catalog

Etc.

Integrated Data Viewer

• A Java based software framework for analyzing and visualizing geoscience data based on the VISAD

• Provides the ability to analyze & display : – satellite imagery

– gridded model output

– surface, upper-air, wind profiler, lightning,

– radar data

– and much more …

• Can create a variety of displays: – 2-D horizontal contours/color-filled contours

– 3-D iso-surfaces

– vertical cross sections

– interactive data probing

– and much more…

Workshops on Use of ACPC-ClimDev Numerical Weather Prediction and Early Warning System

• Workshop themes:

Comprehensive technology needs assessment in African SIDS and mainland countries to facilitate deployment of system

Establishment of community of practice and research themes for further enquiry

• Atlantic Ocean SIDS Workshop - Brought together 20 participants from African SIDS, Gambia, Senegal and experts from USA/NOAA, Iceland and ACPC/ClimDev-Africa:

Benchmarking of model performance based on forecasting of Hurricane Fred and associated storm surge

• Indian Ocean SIDS Workshop - Brought together 12 participants from African SIDS, Gambia, Ghana, Madagascar, Mauritius, ICPAC and experts from Iceland, ICTP and ACPC:

Benchmarking of model performance based on forecasting of Indian Ocean extremes and associated storm surge

Setting up of Numerical Weather Prediction System and Climate Services Information Systems Africa-wide

Hands on training for technicians from Cabo Verde on deployment and management of Numerical Weather Prediction System

Wireless Connectivity in Indian Ocean SIDS

• Support provided to the Indian Ocean SIDS Seychelles,

Mauritius and Comoros realtime transfer data for hydro-

meteorological observational networks, early warning and

data management systems.

• Wireless network connecting the Meteorological office at

Mahe airport with the weather station at Praslin airport has

enabled observed climate/weather data to be transmitted

in realtime

• Capacity established in Comoros to link Met office at Lycee

to met stations at Hahaya and remote stations at Ouani and

Fomboni will enable realtime monitoring of climate and

marine envirionment

• Capacity building and deployment at the University of

Mauritius has generated interest in Internet-of-Things for

monitoring of climate and marine environment.

Seychelles

Comoros

Mauritius

Vision: Catalyze multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary

integrated, demand-driven, climate research and analysis that is responsive to users and development planning needs

Key Goals:

• Enhance ACPC’s links with climate research and operational

centers, as well as other stakeholders and initiatives in order to

improve flow of relevant climate information and services for

policymaking and development planning

• Facilitate multi-institutional and multi-stakeholder demand-driven applied climate research: Collaborative Platform for co-design, and co-production of climate information and services

• Mobilize and promote cross-disciplinary capacity development and training through partnerships with sub-regional, regional, international and Pan-Africa institutions and stakeholders

• Improve development and use of sector-specific climate-related decision support and/or translation tools

Climate Research for Development (CR4D)

CR4D

COORDINATION

PLATFORM

Climate

Analysis &

Simulations

Interdisciplinary

Climate Projects

Regional Climate

Partnerships

Sustainable,

Trans-

disciplinary,

Capacity

Development

Innovative

Decision Support

& Translation

Tools

Scenarios

&

Assessment

s

Communication

&

Dissemination

Impacts

Analysis &

Modeling for

VIA

• Multi-Institution Pilot Research Projects on Sub-Seasonal to Seasonal (S2S) climate forecasting and applications in West and Central Africa

• Developing an inclusive collaboration network of key institutions,

stakeholders, and experts to undertake a Pan-Africa 2 Degree Africa 2020 Climate Impacts Assessment ( 2016-2020)

• Establishing Six multi-institution and multi-stakeholder Regional Climate Research Partnerships (RCRP)-West, East, Central, North, South and African-SIDS as the implementation mechanism for the CR4D Platform Two Regional Workshops to initiate the process (East and

Southern Africa)

• Mapping Institutions , Initiatives, and Expertise on climate research and related applications since 2005

• Developing CR4D 5-Year Strategic Plan ( 2016/7 to 2020/1)

Current and Planned CR4D Activities

Summary, Conclusion and Outlook

Summary and Conclusion

• A continental integrated approach that demonstrates linkages between climate information and development

• First time an CIS e-infrastructure is being widely deployed continentally and addressing the unique needs of SIDS

• State-of-the-art and cost-effective: based on Opensource tools, data and methods

• African Community of practice established – knowledge contribution from all participating member states

• Climate Services Information System installed/deployed by and maintained by ClimDev experts

• Data analysis and visualization system installed/deployed by ClimDev experts

Main Areas of focus for 2016 - 2020

• Consolidate the NWP and EWS system deployed in SIDS and coastal communities - RCCs/RECS, UNOSAT, WMO/GFCS, UNISDR

• Establish technical support and services facility for climate information and services delivery (implementation of GFCS) in SIDS and coastal communities – Socio-economic utility of weather/climate forecasts - RCCs/RECs, WMO/GFCS, AMCOMET/AMCOW

• E-infrastructure deployment in African SIDS and coastal communities (Internet of Things, observing networks, “Big Data” and Analytics) – ICTP/RCC, WMO/GFCS

• Establish a Geo-spatial and remote sensing labs in SIDS and coastal communities for mapping and harnessing marine, aquatic and coastal resources for blue economy development – RCMRD, MESA, RCCs/RECs

• Consolidate the newly established Climate Research for Development and fellowship programmes - (AMCOMET/WMO, RCCs/RECs, Research institutions and networks)

• Support climate change and development governance in Africa and beyond (African ministerial conferences, CCDA, ACTS, African Pavilion) - ClimDev-Africa, RECs/RCCs, AGRHYMET & COMESA

• Support facility for Blue Economy development in Africa - RECs/RCCs and Academia

• Data, Information and Knowledge management (Legacy, lessons and best practices)

• Coordination mechanism for ACP-GCCA in Africa - ClimDev-Africa, AGRHYMET & COMESA

Outlook: Multi-Tier Data Infrastructure

Tier 2: All member states Tier 1: Regional Centres

Tier 0: ClimDev

Tier 0: Contains all open source data and tools in addition to ClimDev data Tier 1: Collaborating Centres with specialized data and tools (RCCs) Tier 2: All member countries accessing infrastructure via web interfaces

Thank You

Harvesters

RDMS

Folders, Entries, Metadata,…

CRUD Search (federated) Access control Event notification …

Basic Services Web UI

APIs HTTP & FTP

File, image, chat,Wiki page, link, script, … DIF, THREDDS, …

HTML RSS Catalog OAI-PMH OPeNDAP KML …

Viewing

Output Handlers

RAMADDA Publishing

HTML

RSS

Catalog

Etc.

Integrated Data Viewer

• A Java based software framework for analyzing and visualizing geoscience data based on the VISAD

• Provides the ability to analyze & display : – satellite imagery

– gridded model output

– surface, upper-air, wind profiler, lightning,

– radar data

– and much more …

• Can create a variety of displays: – 2-D horizontal contours/color-filled contours

– 3-D iso-surfaces

– vertical cross sections

– interactive data probing

– and much more…

Workshops on Use of ACPC-ClimDev Numerical Weather Prediction and Early Warning System

• Workshop themes:

Comprehensive technology needs assessment in African SIDS and mainland countries to facilitate deployment of system

Establishment of community of practice and research themes for further enquiry

• Atlantic Ocean SIDS Workshop - Brought together 20 participants from African SIDS, Gambia, Senegal and experts from USA/NOAA, Iceland and ACPC/ClimDev-Africa:

Benchmarking of model performance based on forecasting of Hurricane Fred and associated storm surge

• Indian Ocean SIDS Workshop - Brought together 12 participants from African SIDS, Gambia, Ghana, Madagascar, Mauritius, ICPAC and experts from Iceland, ICTP and ACPC:

Benchmarking of model performance based on forecasting of Indian Ocean extremes and associated storm surge

Setting up of Numerical Weather Prediction System and Climate Services Information Systems Africa-wide

Hands on training for technicians from Cabo Verde on deployment and management of Numerical Weather Prediction System

Wireless Connectivity in Indian Ocean SIDS

• Support provided to the Indian Ocean SIDS Seychelles,

Mauritius and Comoros realtime transfer data for hydro-

meteorological observational networks, early warning and

data management systems.

• Wireless network connecting the Meteorological office at

Mahe airport with the weather station at Praslin airport has

enabled observed climate/weather data to be transmitted

in realtime

• Capacity established in Comoros to link Met office at Lycee

to met stations at Hahaya and remote stations at Ouani and

Fomboni will enable realtime monitoring of climate and

marine envirionment

• Capacity building and deployment at the University of

Mauritius has generated interest in Internet-of-Things for

monitoring of climate and marine environment.

Seychelles

Comoros

Mauritius

Vision: Catalyze multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary

integrated, demand-driven, climate research and analysis that is responsive to users and development planning needs

Key Goals:

• Enhance ACPC’s links with climate research and operational

centers, as well as other stakeholders and initiatives in order to

improve flow of relevant climate information and services for

policymaking and development planning

• Facilitate multi-institutional and multi-stakeholder demand-driven applied climate research: Collaborative Platform for co-design, and co-production of climate information and services

• Mobilize and promote cross-disciplinary capacity development and training through partnerships with sub-regional, regional, international and Pan-Africa institutions and stakeholders

• Improve development and use of sector-specific climate-related decision support and/or translation tools

Climate Research for Development (CR4D)

CR4D

COORDINATION

PLATFORM

Climate

Analysis &

Simulations

Interdisciplinary

Climate Projects

Regional Climate

Partnerships

Sustainable,

Trans-

disciplinary,

Capacity

Development

Innovative

Decision Support

& Translation

Tools

Scenarios

&

Assessment

s

Communication

&

Dissemination

Impacts

Analysis &

Modeling for

VIA

• Africa’s aquatic and marine resources remain largely unexploited and being recognised for its potential contribution to inclusive and sustainable development

• 38 of 54 African member states are coastal states with 90 percent of Africa’s imports/exports conducted by sea

• Some of the global strategic gateways for international trade are in Africa – underscoring its geopolitical significance

• Oceans have the potential to provide 400% current global energy demands • The fishing sector in Tanzania is 26% more productive than the overall

average, about 150% in Uganda, and more than 500% in Madagascar. • This gives opportunity to linking the Blue Economy sectors, with high

productivity potential, to accelerating structural transformation, primarily in Coastal and Island States in the region.

• The Africa’s Union’s (AU) Agenda 2063 states that “Africa’s Blue economy, which is three times the size of its landmass, shall be a major contributor to continental transformation and growth”.

• The blue economy is referred by the AU “A New Frontier of African Renaissance”

• Over 90% of natural disasters in Africa are due to weather and climate related hazards/conditions

• The SAMOA Pathway articulates the unique challenges of SIDS in addressing climate variability and change and Disaster Risk and calls for urgent action to manage climate risks

Priorities for future activities in Result Area 1: Climate Information Services

Integrate within the Early Warning System an operational DRR data and information management system and practitioners handbook for African SIDS

Build strategic partnerships with CR4D, African universities and research institutions to integrate systems into their processes

Explore the use of innovative emerging technologies to strengthen NMHS and RCCs operational infrastructure and human capacity

Development of sub-seasonal to seasonal climate prediction system for the Indian Ocean RIM countries and its extension to the Atlantic Ocean RIM countries – partnership between UNECA, UNOSAT, ISOR and WMO/GFCS