The deadline for abstract submission to the Africa Climate Conference (ACC-2013) is set to May 31, 2013.
Those selected for oral presentations will be notified by July 1st, 2013, and invited to produce extended abstracts to be included in the conference proceedings.
Efforts are currently underway to secure funding for scientists and researchers to attend the ACC-2013, particularly young Africa-based researchers and female scientists. Preference will be accorded to those whose abstracts have been accepted. Interested participants needing funding assistance to attend the ACC-2013, should specify such need on their abstract submission form.
We look forward to your abstract submissions!
Regards,
The Africa Climate Conference (ACC-2013) Steering Committee
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The Africa Climate Conference 2013
(ACC-2013)
15-18 October 2013, Arusha, Tanzania
Call for Abstracts
The World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) collaborating with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa's Africa Climate Policy Center (ACPC) will host the first ever Pan-Africa Climate Research Conference on 15-18 October, 2013 in Arusha (Tanzania), themed the "Africa Climate Conference 2013: Advancing African Climate Science Research & Knowledge".
The Africa Climate Conference 2013 (ACC-2013) aims to address new frontiers of knowledge on the African Climate system, and narrow the communication gap currently existing between African decision-makers and climate scientists, in order to develop a coordinated collaborative research strategy to improve climate science outputs so that they may better inform climate early warning responses and adaptation in Africa. Concrete pan-African and multi-disciplinary climate research program proposals and a concerted climate research effort, hosted across African climate research hubs, are anticipated from this major climate Conference for Africa.
Bringing together scientists of African climate towards meeting African policy-makers' needs, the ACC 2013 will offer a platform for decision-makers and climate researchers, scientists and practitioners from Africa and around the world, to jointly address a number of priority African climate research frontiers that have been identified through consultation with a broad spectrum of research, applications and user communities initiated at the second Climate Change for Development in Africa (CCDA-II) conference.
The Scientific and Technical Steering Committee of the ACC-2013 now invites abstracts for either oral or poster presentations for the conference sessions detailed in section 2 of this Call. PhD candidates and young scientists from African institutions conducting frontier natural and social science research to improve predictability of the African climate system on subseasonal to seasonal, decadal and longer timescales, and enhance applicability of predictions to end-user needs, are particularly encouraged to submit abstracts. Female researchers are strongly urged to apply.
All interested researchers and practitioners are invited to submit an abstract of at least 500 words and no longer than 1000 Words, by filling the abstract submission form available online at: http://www.climdev-africa.org/acc2013.
The deadline for abstract submission to the Africa Climate Conference (ACC-2013) is set to May 31, 2013.
Those selected for oral presentations will be notified by July 1st, 2013, and invited to produce extended abstracts to be included in the conference proceedings.
Efforts are currently underway to secure funding for scientists and researchers to attend the ACC-2013, particularly young Africa-based researchers and female scientists. Preference will be accorded to those whose abstracts have been accepted. Interested participants needing funding assistance to attend the ACC-2013, should specify such need on their abstract submission form.
1. Background
Africa is highly vulnerable to current climate variability and extremes and most likely to suffer adverse effects of climate change. Current limits to our collective understanding of the African climate system impede our collective ability to deliver adequate early warnings and climate predictions, and restrict the use of climate information by African decision-makers and communities most vulnerable to current and future impacts of a changing climate.
Adaptation policies and actions will be most effective if informed by the best possible science on current and future climate. To achieve this, we must fill the large gaps in our collective understanding of the African climate system, through scientific and applications driven research, in order to ensure that climate research outputs are developed and communicated in a form that is salient and usable for decision-makers and vulnerable communities on the continent.
African climate variability is of fundamental importance to many global climate phenomena currently targeted by the international research community. Examples include at sub-seasonal timescales the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) – important for intra-seasonal rainfall variability in Africa; at longer timescales, basin-scale sea surface temperature fluctuations – important drivers of African seasonal drought and flood, and at still longer timescales, decadal ocean variability - a potential driver of decadal oscillations in rainfall such as seen in the Sahel.
The World Climate Research Programme (WCRP), has defined global research frontiers and imperatives and, through its core projects, is delivering research and databases to advance, among other topics, climate model improvement, sub-seasonal to seasonal prediction, decadal prediction, climate change scenarios and understanding, climate extremes prediction and sea-level rise. For sub-seasonal timescales, collaborative projects with the World Weather Research Programme (WWRP) are addressing predictability and interactions between weather and climate timescales – notably the role of tropical convection. In these initiatives the challenge of making research results useful and easily accessible to end users such as adaptation planners and policy makers is explicitly recognized. Adequate observations of climate are essential to all the above activities and in this context the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) programme is coordinating development of the observational resources needed for climate research, monitoring, prediction and national development. African scientists and some institutions are involved in such international programmes.
The year 2012 has seen the approval of the Implementation Plan of the Global Framework for Climate Services (GFCS) - a major international initiative developing under the United Nations (UN) system and led by the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO). Building on the activities and initiatives described above, as well as others, the GFCS aims to mainstream value-added climate information for decision makers through user-driven and science-based activities. The structure of the GFCS is based on 5 components or Framework 'pillars': observations and monitoring; research, modeling and prediction; a system for climate service provision; a user interface platform and capacity building.
There is thus a strong context of global infrastructure development, research and other initiatives with direct relevance to the African continent. The African Climate Conference 2013 will provide a forum to assemble and review these activities, and a means of channeling their relevance for Africa in a coordinated focus on African climate research and user-driven climate services.
2. Conference Themes: Africa Climate Research Frontiers
Africa Climate Conference 2013 (ACC-2013) abstracts and speakers will need to address one or more of the following 9 Conference themes, as follows. Conference themes are mapped onto 16 identified priority Research Frontiers of African Climate Research to address the critical information needs of African end-users, policy-developers and vulnerable communities, to adapt to a changing climate and manage risks, now to the mid-to-end 21st century.
Abstracts should demonstrate understanding of the state of knowledge of the relevant research frontier and state clearly progress/new findings to be presented, as well as remaining gaps. All findings and good practice evidence from frontier research on each Climate Research Frontier will be compiled and circulated ahead of the Conference, to serve as a solid basis of evidence to guide discussion and agenda-setting during the ACC-2013.
1. To support strategic ahead-of-season planning (1-month to 12-months outlook)
· Research frontier #1: Understanding and prediction of SST variability. Particularly attention will be given to frontier research on ocean basins less studied than the tropical Pacific ENSO region (e.g. Indian Ocean, Tropical Atlantic) that have comparable impacts on African rainfall.
· Research frontier #2: Understanding and representation of teleconnections in models to enhance forecast performance and interpretation.
2. To support intra-seasonal risk monitoring and management to inform within-season operations (5 to 40 days range)
· Research frontier #3: The Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) is the dominant mode of intra-seasonal variability in the tropics. Improved understanding and modelling of its impact on the temporal distribution of African seasonal rainfall, including rains onset and cessation, is a key research frontier.
· Research frontier #4: Convective systems, including mesoscale processes, are key rain-bearing systems, however, these processes are not well understood in Africa. Correct representation of these processes and their links to the larger scale circulation is essential for realistic simulation of typical temporal variability in rainfall and thus to the capability to predict risks of prolonged dry spells or periods of heavy rain and other high impact events.
3. To support longer-term strategic planning/policy development (next 1-10 years)
· Research frontier #5: Understanding of the drivers of natural decadal variability over Africa and its interaction with the climate change signal.
· Research frontier #6: Comprehensive evaluation of decadal prediction systems dedicated to regional prediction of near term climate change, geared towards providing early guidance on the likelihood of changes in seasonal rainfall patterns, hazardous weather and extreme climate events (such as recurrent drought in the Sahel and the 2011 Greater Horn of Africa drought). Where available also, evidence of good practice in exploring the potential for tailored multi-annual to decadal
forecast products, trialed with users (adaptation policy developers and national planners).
4. To support Climate change adaptation policy development/planning (next 50 years)
· Research frontier #7: Understanding of processes and feedbacks relating to the carbon cycle, water cycle, aerosols, vegetation and their representation in climate models is needed to improve the physical basis of climate scenarios for Africa. Results of frontier research on the role of land-use changes over Africa in modulating climate change impacts are welcome under this theme.
· Research frontier #8: Good practice in developing robust climate change scenarios at geographical levels appropriate for end-user decision-making. CORDEX Africa researchers are strongly encouraged to submit their relevant findings under this theme.
· Research frontier #9: Attribution of recent extreme events in Africa. Research assessing and refining methodologies for near-real-time attribution of climate events, to provide timely analysis to governments/decision makers. Two important focus areas are: the Greater Horn of Africa region, where recent drying trends and drought episodes appear counter to the predicted longer-term change to wetter conditions, and the Sahel, where recent greening as a long-term trend or a decadal cyclical return of rains needs to be further probed into. Any research improving understanding of climatic changes in these two priority regions, and any other of Africa, are welcomed under this theme.
5. CROSS-CUTTING THEME #1: Assessing the current vulnerability due to recent climate events
· Research frontier #10: Evidence of good practice in improving observation, analysis capability and historical database development as well as development of products from observations. Enhancing the observations network and local capability for analysis of observations for both climate and socio-economic variables through:
· Database construction and reconstruction (including for impact datasets, e.g. crop yields, health statistics, etc.)
· Data rescue
· Analysis of observed data and development into user-relevant products
· Development of better-targeted applications models, across all climate-sensitive sectors.
6. CROSS-CUTTING THEME #2: Estimation of the impacts of climate variability and change
· Research frontier #11: Research on integration of climate predictions on all timescales (seamless forecasting) with application modelling to help optimise usefulness to users. Key areas include: agriculture and food security (regional crop yields; crop pests and diseases); health (movement and onset of diseases); water resources and energy (river flows, irrigation systems, hydro-electric systems, rural and urban water supply).
7. CROSS-CUTTING THEME #3: Decision making at local scales
· Research frontier #12: Initiatives to develop an 'in house' capability for regional downscaling, including of seasonal forecasts, in African centres have been started but need consolidation and promulgation to all regions. Where benefits are demonstrated, these activities can be developed into operational services running in relevant regional African centres. Evidence of successful and less successful methods and experiences developing such in-house capability are welcome under this theme.
8. CROSS-CUTTING THEME #4: Building credibility and confidence in predictions, across timescales
· Research frontier #13: How to better characterize performance, credibility and confidence for predictions on all timescales, most notably intra-seasonal and longer-term climate forecasts, in consultation with end-users, to facilitate use of forecasts across timescales for early warning leading to early action.
9. CROSS-CUTTING THEME #5: Mainstreaming climate services into policy formulation and decision making, at all timescales
· Research frontier #14: How to improve communication of climate services and enhance understanding/trust between providers and users of climate information?
· Research frontier #15: Capacity-building strategies at all levels, including ideas on how best to conduct and encourage education, training, courses, workshops, outreach etc. for effective science-based adaptation and risk management decisions
· Research frontier #16: Effective strategies to foster open partnership between practitioners/users of traditional systems of climate prediction and climate scientists, to bridge the cultural divide and improve the local relevance of scientific forecasts for local decision-making in Africa.
3. Contact
For further information on the abstracts submissions on other topics or general questions relating to the ACC-2013 conference, please email acc2013@climdev-africa.org, or visit the conference website at:http://www.climdev-africa.org/acc2013.
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