ODINAFRICA-IV: Work plan: WP3

WP3: Development of products

This Work Package focuses on supporting NODC to produce high-quality user-oriented products for planners, policy makers, investors and other stakeholders to enable them make well-informed decisions relating to marine and coastal resource use. The capacity to develop products will make the NODCs useful and improve their sustainability.

The type of products to be supported under this Work Package include: marine atlases, forecasts, predictions and scenario development, coastal sensitivity maps, coastal profiles, storm surge modelling, erosion modelling, and HAB early warning systems.. In addition coastal and ocean maps to provide inputs into documents for high level decision making (e.g. policy briefs, state of the coast reports, and strategic and environmental impact assessments).

African Marine Atlas v 2.0

One of the key deliverables of ODINAFRICA-III was the African Marine Atlas(AMA) (see 3.2.2). This product was developed as a Pan-African regional product and as such the maps are at the regional scale. Though continent wide products maybe of interest and provide useful information, their utility for management purposes is limited by their coarse scale. There is a great need for products at national level, and for trans-boundary issues at sub-regional level, possibly based on LMEs

 

Whereas version 1 of AMA, developed by ODINAFRICA-III, focussed on continental scale data, ODINAFRICA-IV will further develop AMA to provide a comprehensive resource for coastal and marine information at the regional,national and local scale. AMA will provide an overview of topics related to African marine and coastal areas, as well as an interactive atlas where the user can select map layers from various organisations to view and query. AMA will also allow the user to search for available layers, view metadata, and in most cases download data. The shift from a continental scale atlas to a regional and national atlas will require data with a higher resolution and this is also one of the reasons to establish the national coordination committees and the policy cycle mechanism referred to under 4.3.

The next version of the African Marine Atlas will be an online mapping application based on Web Map Services (WMS), an OpenGIS international standard that produces maps of spatially referenced data dynamically from geographic information. AMA will use MapServer, an open source development environment for building spatially-enabled internet applications (http://mapserver.gis.umn.edu/). The use of a standards complaint web mapping application will ensure interoperability with other atlas development projects in Africa.

This work package will include the activities required to upgrade the AMA/MapServer system hosted by the IOC Project Office for IODE. The work package will also include support to enable the partner institutions to establish local versions of AMA to deal with national and local issues. This support will also include training and will be included under WP 2.

The African Marine Atlas will form part of an international network of marine and coastal atlases. The International Coastal Atlas Network (ICAN) (http://workshop1.science.oregonstate.edu/join) is a newly-founded informal group of organizations who have been meeting over the past two years to scope and implement data interoperability approaches to coastal web atlases (CWAs). The mission/strategic aim of ICAN is to share experiences and to find common solutions to CWA development whilst ensuring maximum relevance and added value for the end users. The long-term view is for global level operational interoperability which will evolve as the ICAN community strives to increase awareness of the opportunities that exist for increased coastal and marine data sharing among policy makers and resource managers as strategic users of a CWA. IODE is a participating institution in ICAN and through this association other ICAN members will be invited to assist ODINAFRICA-IV with expertise to develop national as well as sub-regional and regional atlas products.

In addition the “Coordination Centre for Integrated Coastal Zone Management” (http://www.kustbeheer.be) will be invited to assist with optimization of the mapping products to ensure they are user-friendly and address the needs of the user audiences.

Other Products

The identification of national priority products will be undertaken by the National Coordination Committee, which will also undertake a gap analysis of data and skills required to develop the products. The on-going projects funded by other organisation will provide crucial inputs in this process and must be engaged. Examples of products currently being discussed with partners are included in the Information boxes, including collaboration with ASCLME (Box 1) and IOC/ICAM (Box 2).

The ODINAFRICA Planning and Review workshop (Mombasa, July 2008) agreed that the products will have to address the following priorities:

  • SHORELINE CHANGE (yearly rates of shoreline erosion and accretion, coastline maps and profiles, showing yearly shoreline erosion and accretion rates, Tide data and Bathymetric (products) charts) , and non-tidal sea level anomalies which reflect upwelling or storm surges and which can be assimilated into local ocean models. Evaluation of the sea level rise trend along Africa coasts.
  • MARINE RELATED HAZARDS AND DISASTER MANAGEMENT.  (Coastal inundation maps and coastal flooding protection guide, storm surge prediction and tsunami alert manual, climate prediction models, extreme events, annual coastal pollution maps). This work should be done at national and regional levels.
  • MANAGEMENT OF KEY ECOSYSTEMS (manual on critical habitats such as mangroves, coral reefs, etc)
  • SUSTAINABLE USE OF RESOURCES (Productivity of coastal waters, Biodiversity Status and Assessment, Fish stock levels.  Dynamics of the upwelling based on remote sensing data and in situ SST measurements.

Box 1: Decision making on shoreline change, storm surge, and flooding based on climate change scenarios.

 

Description: Visual aids such as vulnerability maps and interactive scenario tools will be developed to support government assessments and decision making on shoreline change, storm surge, and flooding. This will be done taking into account climate change scenarios and support adaptation and mitigation strategies. Activities will be undertaken with key partner programmes. The collaboration with the ACCC Project outlined below is an example of proposed co-financing and collaboration for development of products. Similar arrangements with other national and regional project partners will be sought Africa wide.

Products developed may support the following for decision making on climate change and storm surge vulnerability and adaptation:

  • · Vulnerability assessments (e.g. ACCC – Outcome 3 – Monitoring of coastal erosion and capacity building in coastal management and planning enhanced).
  • · Integrated coastal management programmes and action plans (e.g. ACCC – Outcome 2 – Climate change and adaptation issues and coastal area management policies and programmes integrated, and Outcome 3).
  • · Formulation and integration of zoning and support of regulation (ACCC - Outcome 2 and 3). 

 

Priority Area: Shoreline change/ Marine related hazards and disaster management

Key stake holders: NODCs, NCCs, line ministries and regional and national projects undertaking data collection and planning decisions on shoreline change, storm surge and flooding.

Technical and training skills: Pre and Post-processing of GIS, RS and insitu data; Spatial data manipulation and analysis. Multidisciplinary analysis of oceanographic, marine,  and geographic sciences.

Data inputs required from the Atlas or elsewhere: Data from various themes of the marine atlas including Biosphere, Hydrosphere, Geosphere and the Human environment; Insitu physical and socio-economic data; Remote Sensing and Aerial photographs and derived GIS datasets and delineations.

Dissemination: In addition to product application outlined, all information will be available in the national and regional marine atlases for the general public. Education, and outreach materials for the media and government will be developed in Work Package 4.

Box 2 shows examples of other possible products relevant to trans-boundary and national decision making.

Box 2: Spatial ocean and coastal resource mapping and scenario products supporting trans-boundary and national decision making

 

Description: Visual aids such as maps and interactive scenario tools will be developed to support government assessments and decision making on resource management. This will be done in association with activities of key partner programmes. The collaboration with ASCLME outlined below is an example of proposed co-financing and collaboration for development of products. Similar arrangements with other national and regional project partners will be sought Africa wide.

Products developed may support the following for decision making in the ocean and coastal zones:

  • Baseline and change assessments of environmental good and services, including socioeconomic influences, supporting National State of the Environment reporting as well as ongoing regional assessments and convention monitoring requirements (e.g. ASCLME – Outcome 1 – Information Capture for the development of Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis- TDAs).
  • Recommendations and planning decisions for management of critical goods and services such as marine protected areas and biologically rich habitats (e.g ASCLME Outcome 1 - Output 1.2.b: Information on near-shore fisheries, nursery areas and other biologically rich habitat)
  • Interactive visual scenario tools for coastal planning, TDA’s, and other decision making - including changes in vulnerability of resources both spatially and over time (e.g. Outcome 1- Output 2.4 Use of GIS and predictive models expanded to increase system knowledge) 

 

Priority Area: Management of Key Ecosystems and Sustainable Use of Resources.

Key stake holders: NODCs, NCCs and line ministries, regional and national projects undertaking data collection of relevance to decision makers:

Technical and training skills: Pre and Post-processing of GIS, RS and insitu data; Spatial data manipulation and analysis;

Data inputs required from the Atlas or elsewhere: Data from various themes of the marine atlas including Biosphere; Hydrosphere Geosphere and the Human environment; Insitu biological, physical and socio-economic data; Remote Sensing and Arial photographs and derived GIS datasets and delineations.

Dissemination: In addition to product application outlined, all information will be available in the national and regional Marine Atlases for the general public and education, and outreach materials for the media and government will be developed in Work Package 4.

The following are the priority areas for some of the on-going projects along the African coastline:

 

 

PROJECT

PRIORITY ACTIVITIES ADDRESSED:(1) Shoreline changes, (2) Marine related hazards and Disaster Management, (3) Management of key ecosystems and (4) Sustainable use of resources

1

2

3

4

South Western Indian Ocean Fisheries Project – SWIOFP [ASCLME region]

 

 

X

 X

“Addressing land-based activities in the Western Indian Ocean - WIO-LaB [ASCLME region]

X

 

X

 

Agulhas and Somali Current LME project

 

 

X

X

Integrated Management of the Benguela Current Large Marine Ecosystem (BCLME)

 

 

X

X

Adaptation to Climate Change – Responding to Coastline Change in its human dimensions in West Africa through Integrated Coastal Area Management – ACCA [CCLME region]

X

X

 

 

Combating Living Resources Depletion and Coastal Area Degradation in the Guinea Current LME through Ecosystem-based Regional Actions [GCLME region]

 

 

X

X

The African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analyses & Programme Regional d’Océanographie Physique en Afrique de l’Ouest  - AMMA-PROPAO [GCLME region]

 

X

X

 

 

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