Water and Environmental Change in Africa

The Green Wall Initiative of Africa. Picture from: National Geographic What is the Green Wall Initiative? In recent years, Northern Africa in particular has seen a decline in the quality of arable land notably due to climate change and poor land management. Desertification, land degradation and drought along with climate change and extreme weather events has a drastic impact on the food security and livelihoods of communities living in the Sahel region of Northern Africa. The Green Wall for the Saharan and the Sahel Initiative (GGWSSI) was proposed in 2005 with the objective of growing 8000 km long line of trees and plants across the entire Sahel from Senegal to Djibouti crossing 12 African nations to try and halt desertification The objectives are: "By 2030 restore 50 million hectares of land, sequest 250 million tons of carbon; support 300 million people in communities along the Sahel and provide access for 10 million smallholder farmers to climate resilient agricultural technol...

The Congo Basin is located in Central Africa spanning across six countries. It is one of the three main rainforests worldwide and plays a key role in regulating monsoon patterns across much of Africa. There are about 10,000 species of tropical plants in the Congo Basin and approximately 30% are endemic to the area. Additionally many endangered animals call the Congo home from mountain gorilla, chimpanzees and forest elephants. The Congo rainforest has been inhabited by humans for over 50,000 years and is key to providing them with shelter, food and freshwater. Increasing rates of deforestation is threatening this fragile ecosystem and not only is the biodiversity within under threat, but the entire hydrological cycle of Africa as well.  Picture courtesy of: Planet.com  representing the  Congo Basin in green The Congo basin is highly dependent on precipitation as there are few low intensity aquifers in the region to sustain farming and human activity. Much of the economic...

The new Netflix documentary " Brave Blue World - Racing to Solve our Water Crisis" explores the innovating technologies and sciences that have the potential  to help solving the world's  water crisis. It focuses its story line on multiple countries across Africa and discusses the innovative ways to provide safe water and sanitation facilities to the global population in a changing world. There is an emphasis on how environmental change is altering the way people access clean freshwater and many of the case studies discussed are in African nations.  The documentary aims to make the viewers question their beliefs on fresh water access by asking questions such as: is water a global issues? Is water a scarce resources? Is technology the solution to accessing clean water? The production team visited sites across the world and met with pioneers that are employing original techniques to solve water issues within their communities.  Beth Koigi, the founder of...

Cover image courtesy of: NCM In this blog, my aim will be to explore the relationship between water and environmental change on the African continent.  The focus of this blog will be about how deforestation and land use change is affecting the hydrological cycle in the world with a direct focus on Africa and the Congo Basin. Moreover the relationship between water and Africa will be explored on a large scale to understand why water has always been an issue in Africa and highlight how the changing environment is deepening these issues.  The reason I want to explore this subject of environmental change and water is that "Water is the primary medium through which people in Africa will experience climate change impacts" ( Taylor, 2001:1 ). Through this, my blog will dive into issues such as how deforestation affects the global hydrological cycle, land use change and extreme weather events to further understand how water is linked to economic, social and political issues in Africa...