Enhancing Satellite Oceanography-Driven Research in West Africa: a Case Study of Capacity Development in an Underserved Region.

Marine business and resources play a major role in the economics and way of life in coastal West African countries. Such countries see great profitability from their marine resources while also facing challenges that come with a bordering sea. Despite this fact, there has been limited research into the optimal way for West African Coastal States to coexist with, and sustainably use their marine resources, a research deficit that is mainly due to a lack of infrastructure for in-situ work, lack of capacity development, and comprehensive datasets to undertake oceanographic research. The Coastal Ocean Environment Summer School in Ghana (COESSING; www.coessing.org) was developed to help meet some of these challenges. Each summer since 2015, ocean scientists (e.g., biologists, chemists, physicists, hydrologists) from the USA and Europe have collaborated with West African colleagues to lead a week-long intensive summer school in Accra, Ghana, alternating in location between the Regional Maritime University and the University of Ghana. The school receives in excess of 100 participants drawn from universities, government agencies, and the private sector organizations, mainly from Ghana and neighboring Liberia, Nigeria, Togo, and Benin, among others. The format of the school includes morning lectures, afternoon field trips, and hands-on laboratory exercises and one-on-one coaching of students. Important to the COESSING program is the satellite oceanography component which introduces participants to the extensive and often free, remotely sensed oceanographic datasets. Participants develop skills that allow them to access, process, and analyze these datasets in order to better understand regional oceanographic phenomena, such as upwelling, pollution, habitat characterization, sea level rise, and coastal erosion. Following the school, facilitators keep in touch with program participants, helping them acquire and analyze data for their studies, dissertations, and often graduate school applications, etc. In summary, schools such as COESSING are critical not only for science in the region but for the global ocean community as such training develops eager, bright minds while leading to improved regional observing and modeling strategies in severely under-sampled seas. Here, we describe a unique case in which satellite oceanography has led to such outcomes for countries bordering the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa.

Modeling future flows of the Volta River system: Impacts of climate change and socio-economic changes.

As the scientific consensus concerning global climate change has increased in recent decades, research on potential impacts of climate change on water resources has been given high importance. However in Sub-Saharan Africa, few studies have fully evaluated the potential implications of climate change to their water resource systems. The Volta River is one of the major rivers in Africa covering six riparian countries (mainly Ghana and Burkina Faso). It is a principal water source for approximately 24 million people in the region. The catchment is primarily agricultural providing food supplies to rural areas, demonstrating the classic water, food, energy nexus. In this study an Integrated Catchment Model (INCA) was applied to the whole Volta River system to simulate flow in the rivers and at the outlet of the artificial Lake Volta. High-resolution climate scenarios downscaled from three different Global Climate Models (CNRM-CM5, HadGEM2-ES and CanESM2), have been used to drive the INCA model and to assess changes in flow by 2050s and 2090s under the high climate forcing scenario RCP8.5. Results show that peak flows during the monsoon months could increase into the future. The duration of high flow could become longer compared to the recent condition. In addition, we considered three different socio-economic scenarios. As an example, under the combined impact from climate change from downscaling CNRM-CM5 and medium+ (high economic growth) socio-economic changes, the extreme high flows (Q5) of the Black Volta River are projected to increase 11% and 36% at 2050s and 2090s, respectively. Lake Volta outflow would increase +1% and +5% at 2050s and 2090s, respectively, under the same scenario. The effects of changing socio-economic conditions on flow are minor compared to the climate change impact. These results will provide valuable information assisting future water resource development and adaptive strategies in the Volta Basin.

Coastal erosion management in Accra: Combining local knowledge and empirical research.

Coastal erosion along the Accra coast has become a chronic phenomenon that threatens both life and property. The issue has assumed a centre stage of national debate in recent times because of its impact on the coastal communities. Lack of reliable geospatial data hinders effective scientific investigations into the changing trends in the shoreline position. However, knowledge about coastal erosion, by the local people, and how far the shoreline has migrated inland over time is high in the coastal communities in Accra. This opens a new chapter in coastal erosion research to include local knowledge of the local settlers in developing sustainable coastal management. This article adopted a scientific approach to estimate rate of erosion and tested the results against perceived erosion trend by the local settlers. The study used a 1974 digital topographic map and 1996 aerial photographs. The end point rate statistical method in DSAS was used to compute the rates of change. The short-term rate of change for the 22-year period under study was estimated as -0.91 m/annum ± 0.49 m/annum. It was revealed that about 79% of the shoreline is eroding, while the remaining 21% is either stabilised or accreting. It emerged, from semi-structured interviews with inhabitants in the Accra coastal communities, that an average of about 30 m of coastal lands are perceived to have been lost to erosion for a period of about 20 years. This translates to a historic rate of change of about 1.5 m/year, which corroborates the results of the scientific study. Again this study has established that the local knowledge of the inhabitants, about coastal erosion, can serve as reliable information under scarcity of scientific data for coastal erosion analyses in developing countries.