Author(s): Natalia Limones; Marcus Wijnen; Aleix Serrat-Capdevila
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Abstract: The Angolan part of the Cuvelai basin is suffering a severe drought from 2013 to the time of writing of this document (2022), which has also affected the remaining part of the basin in Namibia (Liu et al., 2021) and the rest of the South of Angola (Limones et al, 2020). Throughout these years, some episodes of abundant rain brought some occasional relief, but were not enough to initiate a recovery. In March 2022, the SPEI global drought monitor (https: //spei. csic. es/map/) marked the southern half of Angola, with the upper Cuvelai basin as its core, as the current major hotspot of extreme long-term drought (SPEI48 drought index < -4) in the world, with some states of the center of Brazil and the western half of South Africa. Recent research reveals that climate change has already modified rainfall intra-annual and inter-annual variability and seasonality, and has increased the frequency of droughts in the region (Limones et al, 2020; Makondo and Thomas, 2020). According to the Angola Drought Post Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA) prepared by the United Nations Development Programme Post-Disaster (UNDP) in 2017, the Cunene province- containing the Cuvelai upper basin- was the most impacted one in the country by then. Subsequent analyses by the World Bank confirm that the situation has only worsened afterwards in the area (Serrat-Capdevila et al., 2022). The livelihoods of the growing population of the Cuvelai rely increasingly on cattle herding and subsistence agriculture (Mendelsohn et al. 2013), which were the most affected sectors (Angola PDNA, 2017). This study focuses on a part of the Angolan southern province of Cunene: the chanas (also called oshana, or ishanas) drainage area at the western section of the Cuvelai river basin, in the border with Namibia (see Figure 1).
Year: 2022