Empirical evidence points to more and more frequent floods in the region. For example, Niamey in Niger has been flooded two times between 1971 and 2000, but eight times between 2000 and 2020. The economic impacts have been significant. Flood management is not generally well developed in West Africa, hence stakeholders are typically taken by surprise leading to a post-catastrophe crisis management. Several initiatives over the past years aimed at improving flood forecasting, alerts and management. In this context the FANFAR project was very timely, making several advancements beyond the state-of-the-art, for example: (1) providing daily updated flood forecasts, (2) mapping the flood risks for the entire West Africa, (3) assimilating local observations and EO data to improve forecast accuracy, (4) distributing of flood notifications through accessible technologies, and (5) operating using robust cloud-based ICT infrastructure. These technical advancements were framed by activities to reinforce human capacity to set up, operate, customize and improve the operational forecasting system, as well as to utilize the support channels.
Overall, the expected results until the end of the project were to provide a co-designed, co-developed, integrated, and co-operated hydrological forecasting and alert pilot system for West Africa; to analyze behavioural responses and understand technology adoption processes while introducing of the forecasting system in the region, and to pave the way for sustainable application and long-term operation of the system in the region.
The potential impacts of FANFAR are significant and far-reaching. FANFAR directly addresses the societal challenge of securing societies against flood hazards, which is an urgent challenge in West Africa.
Saved lives and property:
“In September [2020], we received an early warning from the FANFAR system which saved approximately 2,500 lives. The warning helped us evacuate five communities near the Jebba dam before more than 200 houses were destroyed by the flood,” says Aishatu Tani Ibrahim, Director of Engineering Hydrology at the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency in Abuja, Nigeria
One month later, a similar warning protected life and property in four communities when those responsible for the water management could release water from the Shiroro dam before the peak water flow occurred, thereby avoiding severe flooding.
All-in-all with better flood forecast and alert information, societies, NGOs, businesses and citizens in West Africa have begun to move from post-catastrophe crisis management to pre-event informed preparation and planned response. This in turn has enabled many positive effects on society such as less infrastructure damage, more efficient dam management, and lives saved.
Building on the achievements to date, hydrological services, emergency management agencies, and river basin organisations have expressed a keen desire to sustain the long-term operation and improvement of the system, and to extend the capacity development. One representative of these organisations expressed it as follows:
“FANFAR is very important because climate predictions for West Africa shows that there will be more rain and increased rainfall intensity that will cause floods. Hence there is a need for FANFAR to give early warning to people so that preventive measures can be adopted in time,” says a West African hydrological services agency.
