Flooding is a rapidly growing concern in West Africa. Several floods have occurred in recent years with severe consequences including loss of lives, displacements, disruption to public services, destroyed homes, damaged infrastructure, and delayed transportation. Flooding is also projected to increase with climate change. Hence, there is an urgent need for improved flood management in the region.

Access to operational forecasts and alerts is a critical component in addressing the flood challenges in West Africa. FANFAR is an European Union-financed project that co-designs, co-adapts, and co-operates a short- and medium-term hydrological forecasting and alert pilot system for West Africa. It aims to provide key stakeholders with reliable and timely access to operational forecasts and alerts enabled by a robust forecast production system adapted to regional conditions and operated by West African institutions.

FANFAR enhances the capacity of West African institutions to forecast, alert for and manage floods.

capture of flood ivory coast
Photo of a road during a severe flooding situation in Ivory Coast in September 2018. Courtesy: Edouard Ouattara.
Flow of information
The operational forecasting chain used in FANFAR. Each day a new hydrological forecast is produced and distributed to enable productive applications in West Africa.

FANFAR aims to provide reliable and timely access to flood forecasts and alerts through a range of distribution channels to ensure that the information actually reaches its target audience. The distribution channels currently include web visualisation, SMS, e-mail, and application programming interfaces (API). The forecasting system is based on an open-source hydrological model employed in a cloud-based Information and Communications Technology (ICT) environment to ensure operational robustness despite frequent cuts to electricity and internet supply in the region.

Read more about the aims and approach of the FANFAR project.

Partners

bar of logo of partners

Find out more about the partners of the FANFAR consortium.

News & events

final-fanfar-stakeholders
June 18, 2021

Finale of FANFAR

English FANFAR adapted to the Covid-19 pandemic and transformed the final workshop into two online sessions gathering 82 West African…
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June 15, 2021

System upgraded – Système amélioré

English  The operational system has been upgraded with improved forecasting chains aimed at providing higher accuracy. Since 1st June 2021,…
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March 18, 2021

Future vision of FANFAR

Key West African and European organisations co-designed and jointly developed the FANFAR pre-operational system providing updated information every day since…
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March 2, 2021

ECOWAS using FANFAR in online regional training workshop. La CEDEAO utilise FANFAR dans un atelier de formation régional

English AGRHYMET is leading an online regional training workshop with ECOWAS Commission and in collaboration with the World Bank from…
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September 29, 2020

Contract between ECOWAS and AGRHYMET – Contrat entre la CEDEAO et AGRHYMET

English ECOWAS and AGRHYMET signed a collaboration agreement in March 2020 to provide technical assistance from AGRHYMET to ECOWAS for…
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Fanfar portal in French
August 24, 2020

Le portail interactif de visualisation FANFAR

Français Le portail interactif de visualisation qui montre les prévisions de FANFAR est maintenant disponible en français. Les soixante termes…
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