The first Forecasters Handbook for West Africa

Bridging the gap between rapidly moving scientific research and specific forecasting tools, Meteorology of Tropical West Africa: The Forecasters' Handbook’, gives unprecedented access to the latest science and combines this with pragmatic approaches to forecasting. It is set to change the way forecasters, researchers and students learn about tropical meteorology and will serve to drive demand for new forecasting tools. The Handbook builds upon the legacy of the AMMA project, making the latest science applicable to forecasting in the region. By bringing together, at the outset, researchers and forecasters from across the region, and linking to applications, user communities and decision-makers, the Forecasters’ Handbook provides a template for finding much needed solutions to critical issues such as building resilience to climate change in West Africa

ANALYSE DE LA CHAINE DE VALEUR DES PALMES DE HYPHAENE THEBAICA(L. MART.) DELA VALLEE DE GOULBI NKABA DANS LA REGION DE MARADI AU NIGER

Faced with the effects of drought and human pressure, rural households have developed a coping strategy by exploiting and marketing palms. This study, conducted in the Maradi region, aims to analyze the palm value chain in order to assess the contribution of palm exploitation to community resilience. The methodology used is based on individual surveys in which 580 actors were interviewed and focus groups involving 6 palms counter management committees. This work revealed the presence of a diversity actors includingharvestors, processors, traders (semi-wholesalers and wholesalers) and consumers who work for the regular functioning of the palm value chain through the established of palms counters. It also emerges from this value chain analysis that each socio-professional group benefits according to its level of involvement and the scale at which it operates. In total, 40,826,460 FCFA are derived from the sale of palms and their by-products per operating season for all the actors surveyed, i.e. an average of 70,390 FCFA per season and per actor. The palms counters have an annual turnover of 278,824,927 FCFA for the five years of activity, i.e. 9,294,164.26 FCFA per counter per year. The revenues and taxes collected allow communities to strengthen their resilience to poverty and food insecurity

Dust

International audienceThis chapter provides guidelines to forecasters to predict dust storms and episodes of dust haze, typically caused by southward advection of large amounts of dust from the Sahara into the southern parts of West Africa. An important source of information for forecasting dust storms or haze is the three-hourly surface synoptic observation (SYNOP), hourly meteorological aviation routine weather report (METAR) and SPECI airport reports network in West Africa. The Spinning Enhanced Visible and InfraRed Imager (SEVIRI) infrared (IR) dust product is the most widely used for operational dust forecasting owing to its near-real-time availability, high time resolution and applicability during day and night. The chapter explains how best to use the data from station observations, remote sensing and numerical models in an operational forecast environment for the two main seasons (November-April Harmattan dust haze (HDH) and April-August convective dust storms in the Sahel)