FANFAR: Reinforced cooperation to provide operational flood forecasting and alerts in West Africa
FANFAR is an European Union-financed project striving toward the vision of achieving efficient flood management in West Africa. FANFAR seeks to realize the societal benefits of hydrological forecasts and flood risk information in order for societies to be aware of and prepared for upcoming floods.
FANFAR gathers a cascade of actors from various disciplines at regional, national and local levels from 17 countries in West and Central Africa as well as external partner countries.
Aims
The overall aim of FANFAR is to reinforce the cooperation between West African and European hydrological modellers, field observers, data managers, operative forecast analysts, emergency managers, developers of information and communication technologies (ICT), satellite experts, and decision analysts in order to provide a co-designed, co-adapted, integrated, and co-operated hydrological forecasting and alert pilot system for West Africa.
FANFAR co-designs the system through regular workshops with representatives from all West African countries, which together define and prioritize system requirements. FANFAR co-adapts the system through joint development using open-source code. FANFAR integrates all essential components of a forecasting system, such that updated forecasts and flood risk information are produced every day. The FANFAR system is jointly operated, supported, and tested by West African and European partners.
Approach
The overarching concept of FANFAR is a multi-level, interdisciplinary cooperation built around stakeholder involvement. Several types of stakeholders are engaged, including:
- forecast producers (involved in the setup, operation, refinement and support of the hydrological forecasting and alert system), and
- forecast information users (involved in applying the forecast and alert information for productive purposes in society, e.g. civil protection agencies, emergency response aid organizations, farming cooperatives, and reservoir managers).
The FANFAR project has three dimensions: (i) the ICT cooperation cycle, (ii) behaviour and decision analysis, and (iii) sustainability.
The ICT cooperation cycle (green box) focuses on collaboratively adapting and deploying existing ICTs to ensure they respond to the needs and conditions in West Africa. An iterative process is followed to build and refine the forecasting system, consisting of the following steps:
- define specific user needs,
- prioritize needs and co-design system adaptations,
- co-adapt, develop and integrate the system components and its outputs,
- demonstrate system functionalities,
- develop capacity on how to utilize, operate, customize, and maintain the system, how to access and interpret its outputs, and how to contribute with improvements,
- operate, maintain and support the system, and
- test the system and provide feedback for the next iteration of the cooperation cycle.
This process is iterated several times, principally through four workshops in West Africa gathering an interdisciplinary group of stakeholders involved in flood management (scroll down to see the list of organisations).
The second dimension of FANFAR (blue box) is dedicated to better understand and enhance decision-making and technology adoption processes. Using a transparent and voluntary approach based on Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis and Behavioural Operational Research, stakeholders’ preferences and behaviour are analysed before, during and after the introduction of the adapted technologies. This is applied with the aim to better understand preference formation, identify critical variables that can alter preferences and enhance technology adoption, and facilitate system sustainability.
The third dimension of FANFAR (orange box) focuses on system sustainability and exploitation. Here we analyse, for example, (i) the requirements for sustained operations led by West African institutions (e.g. system costs, integration into operational workflows, additional technology transfer needs, suitable roles for different institutions), (ii) key constraints to future operations (e.g. human and financial resources, regulations), and (iii) key opportunities (e.g. combining the FANFAR system with complementary initiatives in the region). Together with appropriate partners, we strive to identify and exploit appropriate financing mechanisms to enable long-term operation of the system beyond 2020.
The FANFAR consortium
The FANFAR consortium is composed of a well-balanced group of partners from six differents institutions in West Africa (Niger and Nigeria) and in Europe (Italy, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland) together providing the necessary expertise to carry out the project.
The Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) is an expert agency under the Ministry of the Environment and Energy in Sweden. Through unique expertise in meteorology, hydrology, oceanography and climatology, SMHI contributes towards greater public welfare, increased safety and a sustainable society.
The hydrologists from SMHI have expertise in constructing, adapting and operating national and continental hydrological forecasting systems, and expertise in capacity development. SMHI coordinates the FANFAR project and leads work package 1 on ‘Management, dissemination and communication’.
Project coordinator is Jafet Andersson.
The AGRHYMET Regional Center is a specialized international institution in West Africa, created and mandated by thirteen member states to provide operational information for decision making in the area of food security, early warning and disaster risk management in the Sahelian and West-African region. AGRHYMET headquarters are in Niger.
The hydrologists from AGRHYMET have the expertise to produce and provide early warning information on hydro-meteorological risks such as floods on a regional level in West Africa, and to train and assist national agencies. AGRHYMET leads work package 4 on ‘Sustainability through capacity, support, dialogues and business development’.
The Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) is a governmental agency established under the Ministry of Water Resources in Nigeria. In line with the World Meteorological Organisation guidelines, and in accordance with international best practice, NIHSA’s primary function is to provide data and information on the location of water resources in time and space, their extent, dependability, quality and the possibilities of their utilization and control on a continuous basis.
The hydrologists from NIHSA have expertise in streamflow montioring, flood assessment, alert issuance, and local hydrological knowledge. NIHSA tasks in FANFAR are to co-design and co-adapt the flood forecasting system, e.g. by integrating Nigerian streamflow observations, and to test the forecast information in practical flood management.
The Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag) is a world-wide leading institute for research, education, and expert consulting in aquatic science and technology. Eawag researchers work closely with practitioners to maintain the bridge between theory and practice.
The decision analysts from Eawag have expertise in user participation to incorporate user preferences, objectives and needs in water system design as well as analysing behavioural responses to new technologies. Eawag leads work package 2 on ‘User needs, tests and behavioural responses’.
isardSAT is a R&D enterprise based in Spain that provides services and solutions in the earth observation field. isardSAT develops projects that require the knowledge of the system, which are led by engineers, and projects that require a deeper knowledge of the final product, led by scientists.
The parnters from isardSAT have expertise in utilizing earth observations for hydrological applications in data-sparse regions, and capacity to support system users. isardSAT leads work package 3 focussing on the ‘Forecasting and alert Information and Communication Technology (ICT) system’.
Terradue is an ICT enterprise based in Italy. Terradue’s mission is to innovate services in earth science, tailored for data-intensive applications. Terradue come together to remove barriers and automate cloud data storage, data analysis algorithms and massive computing power.
The ICT experts from Terradue have expertise in integrating, deploying and operating cloud-based ICT systems capable of handling large data volumes and uninterrupted processing. In FANFAR, Terradue operates and adapts the Hydrology Thematic Exploitation Platform (Hydrology-TEP) which provides cloud processing capabilities and links the hydrological model with earth observations and meteorological forecasts.
Organisations contributing to FANFAR
All those organisations are contributing to the FANFAR project and thanks to their input, improve the systems.
| Country | Organisations |
Benin | Direction Générale des Ressources en Eau |
Benin | Agence Nationale de la Protection Civile |
Burkina Faso | Autorité du Bassin de la Volta |
Burkina Faso | Secrétariat Permanent du CONASUR |
Burkina Faso | Direction Générale des Ressources en Eau |
Cap Verde | National Water and Sanitation Agency (ANAS) |
Cote d’Ivoire | Direction de l’Hydrologie |
Cote d’Ivoire | Plateforme Nationale pour la Réduction des Risques et Catastrophes |
Gambie | Regional Disaster Management |
Gambie | Centre National de Gestion des Catastrophes et des Urgences Environnementales |
Ghana | Hydrological Services Department |
Ghana | National Disaster Management Organisation |
Guinée | Direction Nationale de l’Hydraulique |
Guinée | Centre National de Gestion des Catastrophes et des Urgences Environnementales |
Guinée Bissau | Direction Générale des Ressources Hydriques |
Guinée Bissau | Service National de protection civile |
Liberia | National Disaster Management Agency |
Liberia | Liberian Hydrological Service |
Mali | Direction Générale de la Protection civile |
Mali | Direction Nationale Hydraulique |
Mauritanie | Direction Aménagement Rural |
Niger | Direction Nationale de l’Hydraulique |
Niger | Direction Générale de la Protection civile |
Niger | Niger Basin Authority |
Nigeria | National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA) |
Nigeria | NorthSouth Power Company Limited, Shiroro (NSPCL SHIRORO) |
Senegal | Direction de la Gestion et de la Planification des Ressources en Eau |
Sénégal | Organisation de Mise en Valeur du Fleuve Gambie |
Sénégal | Direction de la Protection Civile |
Sierra Leone | National Water Resources Management Agency |
Tchad | Direction des Ressources en Eau |
Tchad | Commission du Bassin du Lac Tchad |
Togo | Agence Nationale de la Protection Civile |
Togo | Direction des Ressources en Eau |
Switzerland | World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) |
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