14 Water Resources in the Sahel and Adaptation …
311
The main objective of this study is to summarize adaptation strategies implemented in Burkina Faso in response to the impact of climate change on water
resources. It does this by first presenting an inventory of water resources and management practices, second by presenting the impacts of climate change on the agricultural sector, hydrology of the catchment areas and the perceptions of the population
regarding climate change, and third by presenting some of the climate change adaptation policies and strategies adopted. These policies and strategies are discussed at
the levels of the rural community, government authorities and international agencies
through empirical research.
2 Water Resources
The demand for domestic water is estimated at 104 million m
3 per year, of which
40 million m
3 serves urban and semi-urban demand, and 64 million m
3 serves rural
demand. The supply of drinking water to urban centers is the responsibility of the
National Office for Water and Sanitation. The Office currently manages 56 centers,
37 of which are supplied from groundwater, 12 from surface water and seven from
a combination of the two. In rural areas, the main source of modern drinking water
is provided through wells equipped with human-powered pumps. According to the
official database of the National Inventory of Structures, Burkina Faso had 58,003
Modern Water Points as of 31 December 2015 (MEA/BF 2015), including 48,808
boreholes (i.e., small-diameter wells) and 8,258 drillings (i.e., larger diameter and
deeper wells).
The three sources of water in Burkina Faso are rainwater, surface water and
groundwater; each is discussed in the following sections.
2.1 Rainwater
Burkina Faso has three climatic zones: the Sahelian in the North (600 mm of rain
per year), the Sudano-Sahelian (between 600 and 900 mm) and the Sudano-Guinean
(between 900 and 1200 mm). These climatic zones are illustrated in Fig. 1.
The country has two seasons: the rainy season, from June to September, and the
dry season, from October to May. Rainfall is limited to the rainy season and all
water resources depend on it, as do natural and cultivated plants. At the annual or
the inter-annual scale, precipitation and evapotranspiration control the dynamics of
the country’s hydrosystems (Jalota and Arora 2002). For example, Fig. 2 represents
climate data from 1961 to 2015 at the Ouahigouya station, located in the Sahelian
climatic zone (Mounirou et al. 2012; Zouré et al. 2019), which shows a significant
annual water deficit except in July and August.
311
The main objective of this study is to summarize adaptation strategies implemented in Burkina Faso in response to the impact of climate change on water
resources. It does this by first presenting an inventory of water resources and management practices, second by presenting the impacts of climate change on the agricultural sector, hydrology of the catchment areas and the perceptions of the population
regarding climate change, and third by presenting some of the climate change adaptation policies and strategies adopted. These policies and strategies are discussed at
the levels of the rural community, government authorities and international agencies
through empirical research.
2 Water Resources
The demand for domestic water is estimated at 104 million m
3 per year, of which
40 million m
3 serves urban and semi-urban demand, and 64 million m
3 serves rural
demand. The supply of drinking water to urban centers is the responsibility of the
National Office for Water and Sanitation. The Office currently manages 56 centers,
37 of which are supplied from groundwater, 12 from surface water and seven from
a combination of the two. In rural areas, the main source of modern drinking water
is provided through wells equipped with human-powered pumps. According to the
official database of the National Inventory of Structures, Burkina Faso had 58,003
Modern Water Points as of 31 December 2015 (MEA/BF 2015), including 48,808
boreholes (i.e., small-diameter wells) and 8,258 drillings (i.e., larger diameter and
deeper wells).
The three sources of water in Burkina Faso are rainwater, surface water and
groundwater; each is discussed in the following sections.
2.1 Rainwater
Burkina Faso has three climatic zones: the Sahelian in the North (600 mm of rain
per year), the Sudano-Sahelian (between 600 and 900 mm) and the Sudano-Guinean
(between 900 and 1200 mm). These climatic zones are illustrated in Fig. 1.
The country has two seasons: the rainy season, from June to September, and the
dry season, from October to May. Rainfall is limited to the rainy season and all
water resources depend on it, as do natural and cultivated plants. At the annual or
the inter-annual scale, precipitation and evapotranspiration control the dynamics of
the country’s hydrosystems (Jalota and Arora 2002). For example, Fig. 2 represents
climate data from 1961 to 2015 at the Ouahigouya station, located in the Sahelian
climatic zone (Mounirou et al. 2012; Zouré et al. 2019), which shows a significant
annual water deficit except in July and August.