STOP WORRYING! WATER IS IN THE GAME!
WELCOME to my Blog !
I am a rural girl from the south of France
(Toulouse), always swimming into wild fields of tall grass, enjoying
the sincerity of nature, observing every landscape,
and
every hint
of living creatures. I
often (maybe, too
often) come back home with ticks hanging on my skin. I
am also a lover of mountains, I’ve
been going hiking with my father ever since I was a young child. I
am really sensitive about nature and that's the main
reason why I’m
studying Geography.
(My father and me, after hiking all the very hot morning)
I
am momentarily
at University College of London to carry my thrid undergraduate year
out, as an Erasmus student. I m
trying to manage everything between administrations issues and
language disadvantages, as
I am assisting to the
« water and development in Africa » course.
I picked this
module for a couple of reasons. First, since I was a child, I’ve
always watched ARTE programs (like National Geography) on French TV,
but despite it being in my opinion the
best TV channel in France, Africa is always represented as a huge
desert with zebras and lions running after a poor gazelle. I use to
travel throughout
France, even a bit in the world, and the diversity of landscapes is
not insignificant. So : « How could a such territory have
a single one way of representation ? ».
Therefore, I
realised that I didn't know this continent anyway
in such as near as I thought.
Then, as I said, my representation of Africa is a very hot huge
desert with no water. So, I think this module is the best way to
dismantle my shortcomings about, among others, water and climate.
In
this blog I will talk to
you about Water and Environmental changes in Africa. During my second
year at university, I loved studying climate and meteorology
processes. Furthermore, as I said, I am feeling concerned about the
environmental crisis and the theme of «water and environmental
changes» which have fit
perfectly with my desire to fulfil my knowledge about
water in Africa, and learn more about climate and environmental
challenges in the world.
To introduce the topic, I tried to, merely, learn more about the continent and the water ressource.
Africa is surrounded by water. Mediterranean sea on northern bounduaries, Atlantic ocean on westside, indian ocean on southeast side, and redsea on northeast. despite it is saltwater, freshwater can also be observed on the continent across the Nile and its basin, or the Niger, the Zambezi, the Congo, the Orange (these are the main ones). Rivers are not the only way to find freshwater in Africa.
First,
Africa is not just desertical. Africa is crossed by the Intertropical
Convergence Zone (ITCZ), a
sort of virtual line
constituted of hot convergent air streams which rise causing
precipitations. This ITCZ is responsible for seasonality because it
moves from
south to north and vice-versa. The map following, despite it not
showing the seasonality, it indicates
that the african continent needs probably more umbrellas than us. A
large part of Africa is considered by UNEP as a
large rainfall surplus place.
Furthermore,
I noticed some
sort
of water resource
I didn't think about before : The groundwater. Merely, the water
goes
into the ground, like a
water table for example. And, if
you take a quick glance at the two maps, you’ll be able to notice
that nature is indeed very smart !
The large rainfall zones and the groundwater storage zones
don't take place in the same area,
meaning that where there
are no waterfalls there is groundwater, and where there is no
groundwater there are waterfalls, they are seldom in the same place.
This is probably because of the geology, or the geomorphology.
So, what I understand now, is that we can catch water in Africa from the sky (Rainfall), from the ground (groundwater), and from the rivers.
Thus, overall, water is present onto and into Africa!
" L'EAU EST LA !! " ("Water's here !")
This is a great summary on the geography of water resources in Africa! However, I think that a more critical outlook towards groundwater resources might be necessary given that groundwater at the end of the day takes a long time to recharge and may not be necessarily a renewable resource in the short term. This might be one of the considerations for communities to take into account when managing water resources for a sustainable future.
RépondreSupprimerThanks for your coment Alvin, This is really true, as you said groundwater contains some disadvantages, but I also could say that rainfall is uncertain (particularly in Africa) and also rivers can be dry out. But I decided in this post to not develop these aspects to show that water is present. And maybe among my future posts you will find these shades presented through other phenomenon.
SupprimerYou have provided a great introduction into why you are writing this blog and helped me to understand the misconceptions you want to challenge. I like your formal and comical tone of voice, it is very engaging! I would agree with Alvins comments with regards to access to consistent source of groundwater. However, I suspect atht in future posts you will discuss how environmental challenges impact access to various water sources in Africa. Keep at it! I would encourage you to distinguish between the trends and challenges found within the different geographical areas of Africa and/or specific countries in Africa.
RépondreSupprimerThank you for this constructive coment. I understood that posts should be general about african continent. So I tried to write on very general topics, but can we focus on diferent areas on each post, and make some case studies?
SupprimerHi Julie, You are definitely free to focus on different areas in Africa and make case studies.
Supprimer