AMMA-2050 Output & Tools

Forum Role Play

Working with the Kaddu Yarax theatre troupe in Senegal, IRD have been employing Forum Theatre to support a multi-stakeholder exchange and sharing forum on the issue of genetic resources across all actors, from decision makers to famers. IRD are now scoping a new forum theatre piece around key issues emerging from AMMA2050 project research. While the exact focus is under review, potential issues include: communicating and employing uncertain climate information, new agricultural practices and inputs, gendered roles and decision making.

In Theatre Forum each performance of the play is shown twice. During the replay, any member of the audience is allowed to take the place of one of the characters, showing how they could change the situation to enable a different outcome. Several alternatives may be explored by different spectators. The other actors remain in character, improvising their responses. This approach seeks to break through the barriers between policymakers, decision makers and researchers, putting them on an equal footing to find shared and innovative solutions.

To share emerging learning, IRD produced a film of their experience in employing the theatre forum piece on genetic resources. Both this film and the proposed focus for the Theatre Forum piece related to AMMA-2050 research are due to be shared in a seminar exploring the ethics of collaborative development research to be hosted by King’s College London proposed for September 2018, as well as within the proposed joint WASCAL-AMMA2050 workshop, due to take place in November 2018.

Example visualisations

Animation of a storm development

The storm system produced major flooding in Ouagadougou (“X”) in 2009 as captured by satellite images of cloud-top temperature (°C)

Stakeholder slides

This recording summarises our current knowledge of the projected changes, uncertainties, and recent trends of West African climate. These slides were first presented to stakeholders in Senegal (April 2016 ) and Burkina Faso (July 2016); they also document the baseline of climate knowledge from which AMMA-2050 would build. The first version of these slides have been updated using recent information generated by AMMA-2050 and were used at the stakeholder meetings in May 2018 in Senegal and Burkina. There are two versions of these slides one with a focus on Senegal and the other focusing on Burkina Faso. However both focus on key questions of interest to our stakeholders such as: is it getting warmer? Is it getting wetter or drier? Etc.

Farmer workshop in climate information, Kaffrine, Senegal

Climate Atlas

These are a series of atlases of the changes and uncertainties in user-relevant climate metrics, for West Africa. In our first year of the project we identified climate metrics that are relevant to users, these describe a statistical measure of an aspect of the climate that may change in the future (TR1). Their production required substantial coding which was let by the UK MO, but was also the subject of the training of ECRs in Dec. 2016. The full version 1 series of atlases was a large consorted effort, and these were released in Dec. 2017 in both English and French. These atlases were designed with two audiences in mind (i) climate change impact scientists and (ii) technical experts. The relevancy of these tools to technical experts in Senegal will be assess at the upcoming stakeholder event in Senegal in May 2018. Full details of all the Atlases are available on our Climate Metrics page.

Flickr photos

Intensity Duration-Frequency curves

Characterizing extreme rainfall distribution in a coherent way in space and time is becoming an overarching need that requires using appropriate models of IDF curves. IDF curves are a classic way of synthesising results on estimates of rainfall return levels over a range of durations. This information is of particular importance for infrastructure planning which directly links to the issue of protecting human life and livelihoods. Here we are addressing the challenge of describing rainfall variability at a range of scales that are rarely documented in West Africa. Within AMMA2050 we aim to make these IDF curves widely accessible to a large range of users. To assess their use as a decision making tool, we aim to demonstrate, for the case of Ouagadougou, these IDF curves developed with this method at the scheduled meeting with decision makers in Burkina Faso (May 2018).

IDF Ougadougou output curve

Impact of Sanitation in flooding risk in Ouagadougou Area

WASH and SFD model

The aim of the work is to understand the impacts of climate change on urbanWASH systems. (WASH: Water Sanitation and Health) A tool or platform will be developed to guide selection of cost-effective water supply and sanitation interventions that will reduce the total health burden for the area considered. This work is a collaboration between AMMA-2050 and the HyCRISTAL project supported by the SCD Innovation fund. This partnership is collating information on the flood knowledge of Ouagadougou, at the last consortium meeting in Montpellier Barbara Evans presented this HyCRISTAL work. We now have a plan to develop the tool.

Impact of sanitation in flooding risk