HyCRISTAL updates
HyCRISTAL aims to improve our understanding of key climate-water processes in the region, by working in partnership with a wide range of stakeholders. Professor Barbara Evans and Dr Declan Finney have been involved in knowledge sharing and public engagement events representing HyCRISTAL.
Africa Water Week 2018: Inclusive urban WASH services under climate change
The 7th Africa Water Week (AWW-7) was held in Libreville, Gabon from 29th October - 2nd November 2018. AWW-7 has its theme “Toward Achieving Water Security and Safely Managed Sanitation for Africa” and was participated by governments, regional institutions, international partners, private sector, scientific community, civil society, and international media. Presentations from the conference included a virtual introductory speech from Professor Barbara Evans who gave an introduction about the practical implications of climate change on people's everyday lives in cities particularly their interaction with flooding and sanitation. Professor Evans' presentation was just one of many recorded interventions that formed part of the Future Climate For Africa breakout session on "Inclusive and sustainable urban water, sanitation and drainage services under climate change – lessons from African cities". To view the rest of the recorded presentations, please click here.
Presentation: Climate change and sustainable sanitation in Africa – An introduction – Professor Barbara Evans
Fourth Africa Climate Resilience Investment Summit 2019: Virtual presentations
Professor Barbara Evans and Dr Declan Conway recently presented in the Fourth Africa Climate Resilience Summit – ACRIS IV held in Johannesburg, South Africa from 05th – 07th March 2019. Professor Evans delivered her virtual contribution for the panel session: Climate Risk Management and Resilience: Stepping up our Game in which she discussed how cities could take into account climate change when planning basic infrastructure. Meanwhile, Dr Conway delivered his virtual contribution for the panel session: Managing Land & Water Resources in the face of Climate Change. The overall objective of ACRIS IV summit is to strengthen the capacity of African institutions (including national government, river basin organizations, regional economic communities, power pools and others) together with the private sector to plan, design and implement investment in the sectors of Energy, Water and Agribusiness to increase their resilience to climate change. Both presentations from Professor Evans and Dr Conway can be viewed here.
Python workshops for early career researchers (ECRs)
A Python training workshop was run for Africa-based ECRs in Uganda by Dr Declan Finney, HyCRISTAL Research Fellow. Dr Finney shared programming knowledge and skills with HyCRISTAL researchers and students from Makerere University, and one staff member from the Uganda National Meteorological Authority (UNMA). The workshop activities revolved around introducing Python and bash terminal, interspersed with activities related to reading NetCDFs, analysing the data, plotting, and suggestions of Python-based activities. The ability to apply and understand coding language such as Python is an essential skill for climate modelling and forms part of the capacity development plan for ECRs to in order for them to enhance their skills that would be useful for data analysis on climate information. This initiative has benefited longer-term capacity building in East Africa through the inclusion of university students, as well as supporting HyCRISTAL ECRs in their current and upcoming work. To read more about the Python training workshop, please click here
Dr Declan Finney (above) together with the two-day Python workshop participants