The document describes ADO (African Drought Observatory), a prototype for drought monitoring and forecasting in Africa developed by the European Commission - Joint Research Centre. ADO integrates data on precipitation, soil moisture, temperature, vegetation from sources like GPCC, ECMWF, and MODIS to calculate drought indicators like SPI and fAPAR anomalies. It provides drought monitoring, seasonal forecasts in an interactive map viewer for stakeholders. ADO served as a template for updating the European Drought Observatory map viewer and developing the Global Drought Observatory being implemented for the EU's DG Echo.

1. ADO: a prototype of African Drought Observatory for
drought monitoring and forecasting
Climate Risk Management Unit
European Commission - Joint Research Centre (JRC)
Institute for Environment and Sustainability (IES)
Luana Valentini, Paulo Barbosa, Diego Magni

2. 2
ADO TEAM
Part of the European Drought Observatory’s team
European Commission
Joint Research Centre
Institute for Environment and Sustainability
Climate Risk Management unit
D. MagniL. ValentiniP. Barbosa
A. De Jager
J. Vogt
C. Lavaysse
G. Naumann
H. Carrão
C. Cammalleri
F. Micale

3. 3
EDO
SCADO
DEWFORA
http://edo.jrc.ec.europa.eu

4. DROUGHT
MONITORING
AND FORECAST
4
ECMWF
GPCC
FAO
MODIS
EC-JRC
ADO

5. Data model
5

6. 6
SPI – Standardized Precipitation Index
The standardized precipitation index was selected as a
meteorological drought indicator. SPI is a transformation of the
accumulated precipitation amount over a specific time period
(typically 3, 6, and 12 months, denoted as SPI-3, SPI-6, and SPI-12,
respectively) into a normal distribution of mean zero and standard
deviation 1.
The SPI is a measure of incoming precipitation deficiency, and
many additional factors determine the severity of drought that
ensues, if any (Lloyd-Hughes, 2013).

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Seasonal Forecast
Seasonal forecasting is an essential component of an early drought
forecasting system that can provide advance warning and alleviate drought
impacts.
The ECMWF seasonal forecast system (System 4, hereafter S4) is used: a
dynamical forecast system based on an atmospheric–ocean coupled model, which
has been operational at ECMWF since 2011. S4 generates 51 ensemble members in
real time, with 30 years (1981–2010) of back integrations (hindcasts) with 15
ensemble members and 6 months of lead time.
The extension of the SPI from the monitoring period, i.e. past (can also be
interpreted as initial conditions), to the seasonal forecast range is performed by
merging the seasonal forecasts of precipitation with the monitoring product. The
merging of the two products is basically a concatenation of the monitoring with the
seasonal forecast of precipitation. SPI calculations are performed globally for each
1°× 1°grid cell.

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Seasonal Forecast
Probability Forecast: probability to have wet,
normal or dry conditions for SPI using GPCC data as
monitoring product merged with ECMWF S4
seasonal forecast model. When all the three
probabilities are below 50% we consider that the
forecast is uncertain. ECMWF seasonal forecasts
System 4, based on an atmosphere-ocean coupled
model, were used for the drought forecasting.
SPI of the Ensemble Mean: SPI values computed with
GPCC data as monitoring product merged with ECMWF S4
ensemble mean for the forecasted months.

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fAPAR Anomaly
Droughts affect the vegetation canopy and specifically its capacity to
intercept solar radiation. By consequence, fAPAR and fAPAR Anomaly have
been proposed as a drought indicators (Gobron et al. 2005 and 2007).
ADO uses MODIS fAPAR standard product (MOD15A2) to derive (Brown and
Meyer, 1961; Myneni et al., 2000) fAPAR anomalies and related maps every
10 days, with a baseline from March 2000 to December 2014.
δ = standard deviation

10. System architecture
10
vector
data
raster
data
Data stores
FAO WMS
Mapfile configuration
JRC
WMS
.shp
Oracle tables
.png
.tiff

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Monitoring
GPCC Precipitation
ECMWF Precipitation,
Soil Moisture and
Temperature
MODIS fAPAR
anomaly
JRC Drought
Vulnerability, Risk and
Hazard
Background
information
(JRC, FAO)
http://edo.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ado/ado.html

12. 12
Forecast
ECMWF Seasonal
Forecast –
SPI Probability (%)
ECMWF Seasonal
Forecast –
SPI of the Ensemble
Mean

13. 13
Layer tree – context menu

14. Layer tree – forecast
starting date
of forecast
select
timescale
select month
of forecast

15. Time series
select
location
select
indicator
select
time
visualize or
plot data

16. 16
Map Viewer toolbar

17. 17
Map Viewer functions - identify
Monitoring
Forecast

18. 18
Drought news on map
filter on drought
related news
GeoRSS
http://emm.newsbrief.eu

19. 19
Drought news web page

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EDO Map Viewer ADO-style refreshed
EDO
European Drought
Observatory
Implemented since 2008
First Map Viewer based
on PHP MapScript

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ADO as a template for implementing GDO
GDO, Global Drought Observatory, a Drought Alert System for DG Echo
Implementation started in Spring 2015
It aims to present
red-yellow-green
flags of drought risks
that
occur world-wide and
related web tools
to list, make graphs
and analyze such
events
at country level

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Additional functions available in EDO and GDO (1)
The new Map Viewers of EDO and GDO have been implemented taking ADO
as a template.
But due to their specific needs, they come with some additional tools that are
not enabled in ADO.
Layer tree
 Three-level hierarchy (group  subgroup  layer)
 Multi-theme layers: selection of current theme from contextual menu
 Change layer classification and legend from contextual menu
 Trigger layer visualization in Google Earth from contextual menu
Toolbar
 Toggle Geographical Lat Lon Grid
 Link to Compare Layers (four-map interface to check different indicators
and dates in one go)
 More Zoom To and Go To options
 Toggle highlighted features

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Additional functions available in EDO and GDO (2)
Identify and similar
 Alternative layout for Identify results
 Additional graphs and analysis pop-ups triggered from Identify results
Time series
 Link to Unified Graph Creator (tool to make graphs of more indicators
simultaneously)
Alert tools (GDO, under implementation)
 List of current drought risk alerts synchronized with the current map
extent
 Panel to present a selected drought alert in detail
 Tool to deep the analysis of a drought alert at country level

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Conclusions
• The map viewer integrates drought monitoring and seasonal
forecasting related information in an innovative approach for Africa.
• The system can be considered as a pre-operational prototype, with a
variety of tools and drought related products that are accessible to end
users and stakeholders interested in drought information in Africa.
• The new interface of ADO appears more visual attractive and more
fast for end user than the previous one developed for EDO. Because of
this and of its lighter structure, it has been adopted to refresh the EDO
Map Viewer.
• Also the implementation of GDO as a Drought Alert System for DG
Echo has started taking ADO as a template for its web mapping
functionalities.