5 Climate Change Impact on Hydrological Regimes …
89
However, the persistence of the already observed changes in climate over the past
century (Solomon et al. 2007; IPCC 2014) like the recent increase in the occurrence
of extreme events that are accompanied by enhanced magnitude and severity entails
amplified impacts on future hydrological regimes. Thus, there are still uncertainties
about the specific effects of climate change in different river basins in southern Africa.
This constrains development of river basin specific adaptation measures. Despite
these uncertainties, there is a need to have an improved understanding of potential
hydrological effects of climate change on water resources, e.g. seasonality of the
available water resources, patterns of extreme events such as floods and droughts.
This chapter aims to increase awareness about the potential hydrological effects of
climate change in southern Africa.
2 Water Resources in Southern Africa
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) comprises the following
countries: Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Apart from Sychelles,
Mauritius and Madagascar, the rest of the Southern African countries have 15 shared
river catchments (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1 Location of southern African countries and the major transboundary river catchments
89
However, the persistence of the already observed changes in climate over the past
century (Solomon et al. 2007; IPCC 2014) like the recent increase in the occurrence
of extreme events that are accompanied by enhanced magnitude and severity entails
amplified impacts on future hydrological regimes. Thus, there are still uncertainties
about the specific effects of climate change in different river basins in southern Africa.
This constrains development of river basin specific adaptation measures. Despite
these uncertainties, there is a need to have an improved understanding of potential
hydrological effects of climate change on water resources, e.g. seasonality of the
available water resources, patterns of extreme events such as floods and droughts.
This chapter aims to increase awareness about the potential hydrological effects of
climate change in southern Africa.
2 Water Resources in Southern Africa
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) comprises the following
countries: Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Apart from Sychelles,
Mauritius and Madagascar, the rest of the Southern African countries have 15 shared
river catchments (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1 Location of southern African countries and the major transboundary river catchments