Risk-informed sustainable development in the rural tropics

This Editorial presents the special issue Risk-informed sustainable development in the rural tropics published by the journal Sustainabilit

Renewing climate planning locally to attend the 11th Sustainable development goal in the tropics

In the last seven years, tropical cities with a climate plan have tripled compared to the previous seven years. According to the 11th United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal, climate planning should significantly increase by 2030. The Sendai framework for disaster risk reduction (2015) and the New urban agenda signed in Quito (2016) indicate how to achieve this goal through analysis, categories of plans and specific measures. This chapter identifies the main obstacles to the significant increase in tropical human settlements with a climate plan and the possible solutions. First of all, the distribution and trend at 2030 of tropical human settlements are ascertained. Then local access to information on damage, hazard, exposure, vulnerability and risk, and the consideration of these aspects in the national guides to local climate planning are verified. Lastly, the categories of plans and climate measures recommended by the United Nations are compared with those that are most common today, using a database of 401 climate plans for 338 tropical cities relating to 41 countries. The chapter highlights the fact that the prescription for treating tropical cities affected by climate change has been prepared without an accurate diagnosis. Significantly increasing climate planning must consider that small-medium human settlements in the Tropics will prevail at least until 2030. And most effort will be required from Developing and Least Developed Countries. The recommendations of the United Nations concerning the preliminary analyses ignore the fact that local authorities usually do not have access to the necessary information

Agrometeorological Forecast for Smallholder Farmers: A Powerful Tool for Weather-Informed Crops Management in the Sahel

Agriculture production in Nigerien rural areas mainly depends on weather variability. Weather forecasts produced by national or international bodies have very limited dissemination in rural areas and even if broadcast by local radio, they remain generic and limited to short-term information. According to several experiences in West Africa, weather and climate services (WCSs) have great potential to support farmers’ decision making. The challenge is to reach local communities with tailored information about the future weather to support strategic and tactical crop management decisions. WCSs, in West Africa, are mainly based on short-range weather forecasts and seasonal climate forecasts, while medium-range weather forecasts, even if potentially very useful for crop management, are rarely produced. This paper presents the results of a pilot initiative in Niger to reach farming communities with 10-day forecasts from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration—Global Forecast System (NOAA-GFS) produced by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP). After the implementation of the download and treatment chain, the Niger National Meteorological Directorate can provide 10-day agrometeorological forecasts to the agricultural extension services in eight rural municipalities. Exploiting the users’ evaluation of the forecasts, an analysis of usability and overall performance of the service is described. The results demonstrate that, even in rural and remote areas, agrometeorological forecasts are valued as powerful and useful information for decision-making processes. The service can be implemented at low cost with effective technologies making it affordable and sustainable even in developing countries. Nonetheless, the service’s effectiveness depends on several aspects mainly related to the way information is communicated to the public

Renewing Climate Planning Locally in the Tropics: Conclusions

In the Tropics, a significant increase in the number of cities provided with climate plans by 2020, as announced in the 11th Sustainable development goalof the United Nations, requires an unprecedented effort. To achieve it, we have to simplify the planning process and improve the quality of the plans. The aim of this book was to collect methods and experiences to inspire the simplification of the planning process and increase the quality of climate planning. We focused attention on the three critical phases of the planning process: analysis, decision making in planning, climate measures. Sixteen case studies from Ethiopia, Haiti, Malawi, Mexico, Niger, Senegal, Tanzania and Thailand cover automatic weather stations in remote areas, rainfall estimation gridded datasets, open data for vulnerability index to climate change, early warning systems, quality of climate plans index, multi-risk local assessment, flooding risk evaluation method, backcasting, spatial dimension in disaster risk reduction and resilience, gasification stoves, index-based insurance and vulnerability risk credit. After indicating the possible analyses, 19 recommendations were supplied to the United Nations SDGs monitoring system, the national weather services and those responsible for natural risks, to the Development banks, Official development aid and the research institutions

La filière étatique des semences de riz pluvial en Casamance (Sénégal) : fonctionnement, contraintes et perspectives de développement

Description du sujet. Dans les pays subsahariens et en particulier au Sénégal, les systèmes semenciers traditionnels représentent encore l'option la plus répandue dans l'agriculture familiale nonobstant les nombreux efforts des Etats pour développer des filières semencières modernes et économiquement durables. Objectifs. Analyser le secteur semencier formel du riz pluvial de la Casamance, une région à forte vocation rizicole où le riz représente toujours la première source alimentaire des ménages ruraux, aux niveaux organisationnel et de structuration du marché. Méthode. Les données statistiques collectées ont été élaborées pour décrire la situation de la demande/offre de semences certifiées de riz dans la sous-région et la région ciblée. A travers des entretiens semi-directifs, les acteurs principaux de la filière ont été interviewés pour identifier et analyser les maillons de la filière et combler le gap informatif venant des données quantitatives. Résultats. L'étude identifie les principales limites et contraintes ainsi que les inefficacités du système semencier formel conçu comme filière marchande mais non adapté à un contexte de subsistance où la demande commerciale finale de semences certifiées est presque nulle. Une forte dépendance des acteurs impliqués par rapport aux interventions de l'Etat et de ses partenaires techniques et financiers et le manque d'un cadre de concertation et de planification entre les différents acteurs de la chaîne semencière ont été relevés. Conclusions. La mise en oeuvre d’un système semencier intégré et d’un cadre d'actions à entreprendre pour soutenir l'intégration des différentes composantes de la filière sont proposés. Ce cadre peut être retenu comme une démarche d'orientation et d'aide à l’identification et à la hiérarchisation des interventions de l’Etat et de ses PTF. Description of the subject. In sub-Saharan countries and particularly in Senegal, traditional seed systems still represent the most widespread option in family-based agricultures, despite the many efforts made by Governments to develop modern and economically sustainable seed chains. Objectives. Analyse formal rainfed rice seed sector in Casamance, a rice-rich regionwhere rice is still the main source of food for rural households, at the organizational and at the level of market structure. Method. Collected statistical data were processed to describe the situation of demand/supply of certified rice seed in the subregion and in targeted region. Through semi-structured interviews, the main actors of the sector were interviewed to identify and analyse chain structure and to fill the information gap from quantitative data. Results. The study identifies the main limitations and constraints of the sector as well as the inefficiencies of a seed system designed as a market chain and not adapted to a subsistence context where the final commercial demand for certified seeds is almost zero. A strong dependence of the actors involved in relation to interventions of Government and its technical and financial partners and the lack of a consultation and planning framework between actors and supply systems have been outlined. Conclusions. The implementation of an integrated seed system and a framework of actions to be undertaken in the region to support the integration of various chain are proposed. This framework can be used as tool to orient and assist the identification and prioritization of interventions of Government and its TFP. &nbsp

Assessing the Sustainability of Horticultural Farms in Central Senegal: An Adaptation of the IDEA Method

This paper evaluates the sustainability of the different forms of horticulture farms (individual and collective) in the Groundnut Basin of Senegal using an adapted version of the IDEA method to the Senegal context. Results show that collective farms have higher sustainability scores than individual farms. Also, collective farms are more sustainable in the agroecological scale while individual farms are more sustainable in the economic scale. Results also suggest that although IDEA can be adapted to both individual and collective horticulture farms of Senegal, there is a need to include a fourth scale that will integrate the institutional and organizational features of collective farms as well as the socio-political and research context that can enable or hinder the adoption of sustainable farm practices

Participatory risk assessment of pluvial floods in four towns of Niger

Intense rainfalls in Sub-Saharan Africa are increasing in frequency. Land degradation, watercourses siltation, and flood defence failure turn these events into disastrous floods. Over the last decade flood risk assessments have been prepared to face these disasters. However, they have frequent limitations in design, accuracy, and completeness. The objectives of this study are (i) to integrate local and scientific knowledge into a participated pluvial flood risk assessment (ii) to identify assets and (iii) to estimate the potential impact and efficiency of risk-reduction measures. The assessment is developed in four rapidly expanding towns of Niger, flooded several times in recent years. Flood-prone areas and assets are identified according four flood scenarios using local knowledge, 2D hydraulic modelling, and visual photointerpretation of very-high-resolution satellite images. Risk-reduction measures are singled-out through public participation. The residual risk and benefit/cost analyses provide a decision-making tool to accept or treat risk. During the last decade the expansion of the four towns has been more rapid in flood-prone zones than in safe areas. Nowadays more than half of the housing stock could be flooded by rainfalls with 20 years return period. Catchment treatment and building retrofitting can reduce risk. from 100 to 29–82. Nevertheless, the benefit/cost of risk reduction is high for towns settled in small catchments only

Competencies based innovative learning solutions for co-development of climate services in West Africa

Abstract. In developing countries, and particularly in West Africa, the role of Climate Services (CS) for sustainable development is growing thanks to wide spreading collaboration among European institutions, including National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHS) research centers, universities, and homologue local institutions. Operationally, the implementation of CSs in developing countries is mainly pivoted on NMHS, which, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), are dramatically affected by unmet learning demand. The global scale of learning needs for co-development of CSs calls for innovative solutions and a range of flexible modalities to reach learners in a variety of ways, and for sharing resources and successful strategies within the global education and training community. In order to harmonize expected learning outcomes, WMO defined a competency framework (CF) for CSs to be used in the implementation of training initiatives and knowledge sharing tools. This paper presents the strategic and methodological approach adopted in the implementation of the TOPaCS, a new knowledge-based distance learning initiative, aiming to provide a flexible learning environment within the CSs CF of WMO ensuring coherence with other WMO education initiatives (Global Campus, other RTCs, etc.). The methodological approach adopted is based on the competency-based approach to training, where competencies are composed by elements of knowledge and skill. TOPaCS integrates the WMO CF for CSs into a taxonomy co-designed with stakeholders at different levels, and allows the definition of learning paths, which are a further interactive opportunity for co-development of CSs within the TOPaCS learning ecosystem. Indeed, the approach aims also to guide further instructional strategies and assessments and becomes a starting point to build a common language enabling a better cooperation and exchange between the different CSs training initiatives