Estimation of the Carbon Sequestration Dynamics of Senegal’s Great Green Wall Based on Land Cover over the Past Three Decades

The severe drought observed in the Sahel during 1970s, 1980s and 1990s has deeply affected the population as well as the economies and the eco-systems of this climatic area. The GGW Initiative spearheaded by Africa Union in 2007 proposed to combat the land degradation and desertification by planting a wall of trees stretching from Dakar to Djibouti. A reforestation was then conducted in the Senegal’s GGW since 2006 as part as other areas in the Sahel. This paper aims to evaluate the carbon sequestration dynamics in the sites of the Senegal’s GGW over the last three decades. The method consists firstly of analyzing the evolution of land cover and land use dynamics based on ESA-CCI LC satellite data. There is an improvement of the surface areas of tree and shrub savanna of 11.40% (Tessekere), 8.25% (Syer) and 2.70% (Loughere-Thioly). The regreening of the different localities and a positive dynamic observed is explained by the return to normal rainfall and to reforestation actions, agroforestry practices, better management of natural resources undertaken. However, some non-reforested sites showed an opposite trend despite of the normal rainfall. Secondly, the results on land mapping are used as a proxy for the assessment of carbon stocks. The dynamic observed in vegetation cover since the beginning of the reforestation made it possible to sequester 5.8 million tons of carbon representing respectively 2.31% of African GGW. This gain in stored carbon is equivalent to 21.2 million tons of CO2 captured in the atmosphere. Through this study, it appears that carbon storage becomes significant 8 to 10 years after the start of reforestation. An urbanization without respect for the environmental factors could be a danger for the climate (case of Ballou).

Numerical Study of a West African Squall Line Using a Regional Climate Model

The squall line of 21-22 August 1992, documented during the HAPEX-Sahel campaign, is simulated using the regional atmospheric model (MAR). The simulated results are compared to observational data. The aim of this work is both to test the capacity of this model to reproduce tropical disturbances in West Africa and to use this model as a meteorological one. It allows simulating high moisture content in the lower layers. The MAR simulates well updrafts whereas downward currents are neglected. This result may be due to convective scheme used to parameterize the convection in the model. The forecast of stability indexes used to define violent storms shows that the model is able to reproduce the squall line. Despite some differences with the observational data, the model shows its ability to reproduce major characteristics of the mesoscale convective disturbances.

Analysis and Forecasting of the Impact of Climatic Parameters on the Yield of Rain-Fed Rice Cultivation in the Office Riz Mopti in Mali

During the period spanning the 1970s and1980s, countries in the West African Sahel experienced severe drought. Its impact on agriculture and ecosystems has highlighted the importance of monitoring the Sahelian rainy season. In Sahelian countries such as Mali, rainfall is the major determinant of crop production. Unfortunately, rainfall is highly variable in time and space. Therefore, this study is conducted to analyze and forecast the impact of climatic parameters on the rain-fed rice yield cultivation in the Office Riz Mopti region. The data were collected from satellite imagery, archived meteorology data, yield and rice characteristics. The study employed Hanning filter to highlight interannual fluctuation, a test of Pettitt and the standardized precipitation index (SPI) to analyze the rainfall variability. Climate change scenarios under the RCP 8.5 scenario (HadGEM-2 ES) and agroclimatic (Cropwat) model are carried out to simulate the future climate and its impact on rice yields. The results of satellite image classifications of 1986 and 2016 show an increase of rice fields with a noticeable decrease of bare soil. The analysis of the SPI reveals that over the 30 years considered, 56.67% of the rainy seasons were dry (1986-2006) and 43.33% were wet (2007-2015). The modelling approach is applied over 1986-2006 and 2007-2015 periods—considered as typical dry and rainy years—and applied over the future, with forecasts of climate change scenarios in 2034. The results show a decrease in potential yield during dry and slightly wet years. The yields of rain-fed rice will be generally low between 2016 and 2027. Deficits are observed over the entire study area, in comparison with the potential yield. Thus, this situation could expose the population to food insecurity.

Estimates and Variability of the Air-Sea CO2 Fluxes in the Gulf of Guinea during the 2005-2007 Period

Measurements of CO2 parameters (i.e. Total Alkalinity (TA) and Dissolved Inorganic Carbon (DIC)) were made from June 2005 to September 2007 in six EGEE (“Etude de la circulation océanique et de savariabilitédans le Golfe de GuinEE”) cruises to better assess air-sea CO2 fluxes in the Gulf of Guinea (6°N - 10°S, 10°E - 10°W). Two empirical relationships TA-Salinity and DIC-Salinity-Temperature were established. These relationships were then used to estimate the monthly fugacity of CO2 (fCO2) and air-sea CO2 fluxes. The monthly mean flux of CO2 reaches 1.76 ± 0.82 mmol·m-2·d-1 (resp. 2.90 ± 1.45 mmol·m-2·d-1) at the north of the Equator (resp. at the South). The north-south gradient observed as the patterns of the air-sea CO2 fluxes was mainly driven by the oceanic fCO2. This gradient was due to the low values of the CO2 parameters flowing by the Guinea Current (6°N - 0°) from the west to the east while the air-sea CO2 fluxes increased in the south (10°S - 0). In the north, the climatology of Takahashi underestimated the CO2 fluxes in the Gulf of Guinea when comparing to the estimated fluxes. This was due to the north-south gradient, which did not well reproduce by the climatology of Takahashi.