The Intro - and an overview of current and predicted rainfall patterns

Hello everyone!

Following my interest in future climate change impacts on the planet and the sustainability of water use under these changing influences, I want to dedicate this blog to explore the impacts of environmental change upon Africa’s water. The continent is exceptionally interesting to study due to its diverse spatial distribution of  water and the variety in access to and usage of it.

As Conway et. al. (2009) clearly portray in their examination of rainfall-runoff relationships in catchments of Sub-Saharan Africa, rainfall is the dominant control on interannual and interdecadal variability of river flows and thus renewable surface freshwater distribution. To examine the effect climate change has upon water resources in Africa, I will start my blog by focusing attention on current precipitation patterns.

The two maps below give a good overview of how rainfall varies between and within regions, mainly depending on latitude, season, topography, distance to/from the sea and, of course, global climate circulations. These current patterns give a first indication of the spatial and temporal (see map 2 for annual variability) diversity of renewable surface water flows. Africa's populations and environments are generally highly adapted to the unique local circumstances. However, with predicted anthropogenic climate change, the vulnerability of some areas to change in precipitation is great.

IPCC model predictions (2014) on region-specific future precipitation changes (i.e. frequencies of droughts or flooding) are at most of "medium confidence", however we must note the widely acknowledged ‘intensificationof the hydrological cycle’ in a warming world. This means that even with a relatively unchanged spatial distribution of water, current patterns of precipitation variability (temporal distribution) will increase. Through the course of my blogging I will review detailed climate change impact-studies that reflect this predicted change in rainfall patterns, as well as investigate the varying risk of extreme events like droughts and floods (Thornton et. al. 2014 for a comprehensive overview).