John Borton

Seasonal rainfall forecasting for Africa part II—application and impact assessment

An experimental seasonal rainfall forecast for the African Sahel as a whole has been issued by the UK Meteorological Office for each year since 1986. The scientific aspects of the forecast, including its current and possible future status, have been discussed in Part I of this paper. Here, we examine how the forecast might be applied, and assess the impacts it may have on potential users in Africa. Five groups of users of the rainfall forecasts are identified: hydrological forecasters, crop production modellers, international food aid agencies, national public and para‐statal institutions, and local rural communities. The different decision‐making processes of each of these user groups, and consequently their differing potential to benefit from forecast information, are discussed in turn. It is suggested that forecasts will have their most immediate use at national and international level, but that improvements in institutional efficiency and interaction will need to be made before the potential benefits ...

Seasonal rainfall forecasting for Africa

An experimental seasonal rainfall forecast for the African Sahel as a whole has been issued by the UK Met. Office for each year since 1986. The forecast is issued in the May or June preceding the wet season (mainly the months July to September). Currently, this forecast is communicated directly to National Met. Agencies in the African Sahel who make various uses of it. For the experimental forecast to become operational, several questions need to be addressed: to what extent can the spatial and temporal resolution of the forecast be refined? can the likelihood of a particularly poor forecast be estimated in advance? how best, and to whom, should the forecast be communicated in order to maximise usefulness? what potential benefits are likely to accrue from operational forecasts? and how can the abuse of forecast information be minimised? This paper defines some preliminary answers to these questions drawing upon a range of disciplinary perspectives. In Part I, the current, and possible future, status of th...