Inception Report CLIMATE VULNERABILITY AND WATER RESOURCES VARIABILITY IN WEST AFRICA. SENEGAL AND GAMBIA RIVER BASIN CASES STUDIES

This inception report presents the project "Climate vulnerability and water resources variability in West Africa. Senegal and Gambia river basin cases studies ". It is part of the ACEWATER2 program and is under the umbrella of the Regional Atlas of Water Cooperation.
This report describes the background of the study, the objectives and scope of the work. The Senegal river basin (SRB) is one of the catchments selected by WANWATCE. The Gambia river basin (GRB) have been added by the UCAD’s team, due to their similarities and proximity. The team’s will is to do thorough job and then replicate it in the other basin accross West Africa.
The overall goal of this project is to contribute to better understanding of climate variability and its impacts on water resources availability in trans boundary watersheds of West Africa, particularly in Senegal and Gambia river basin. In the actual Africa’s environmental context, there is a need to understand and mainstream the climate variability and related economic vulnerability. The effects on water resources availability are a major challenge across West Africa and the Sahel zone. The development of databases at basin scale is to perform climate variability/risk analysis by using traditional statistic tools and also new approach with hydrological modeling. At national level, the study will focus on development of climate scenarios based on ground data and simulation tools. According to the ToRs, the three (03) milestones of the project are to be delivered to JRC between December 2017 and February 2019.