DEWFORA

Period:	01/2011-12/2013
Client:	FP7-European Commision

assignment/short description

The principal aim of the DEWFORA proposal is to develop a framework for the provision of early warning and response through drought impact mitigation for Africa.

This framework will cover the whole chain from monitoring and vulnerability assessment, to forecasting, warning, response, and knowledge dissemination.

DEWFORA will address existing capabilities for drought monitoring in Africa and develop improved drought indicators that consider the wider domain of water use and water users, and their dependence on variable water resources.

Through these improved indicators vulnerability to drought at different scales across Africa will be assessed. These indicators will be applied to map drought vulnerability in the current climate, but also the change in drought hazard and vulnerability in the future, changed, climate. Through this understanding, drought preparedness and adaptation strategies appropriate to the African context will be developed.

Warning thresholds that can be reliably forecasted, and advanced meteorological, hydrological and agricultural forecasting methods to predict these thresholds will be developed. Four regional case studies; the Eastern-Nile basin, the Limpopo Basin, the Niger basin, and the Oum-er-Rbia basin, as well as one pan-African case study will facilitate knowledge development, and through detailed comparison of drought forecasting, mitigation and adaptation practices in Europe and Africa the proposal will help advance these in Africa as well as in Europe.

DEWFORA will focus on effective dissemination and knowledge transfer through interaction with stakeholders and capacity building programmes in Africa.

More information: DEWFORA website