| Tanbi Wetland Complex | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Location | Gambia |
| Coordinates | 13°25′00″N16°37′00″W / 13.41667°N 16.61667°W |
| Area | 4500 hectares |
| Established | 2001 |
| Designated | 2 February 2007 |
| Reference no. | 1657 [1] |
The Tanbi Wetland Complex is a wetland reserve in the Gambia, established in 2001 outside the national capital of Banjul.
The wilderness site of the Tanbi Wetland Complex lies on the southern channel at the mouth of the Gambia River. It covers an area of about 6,000 ha, of which mangroves make up 4,800 ha, located to the west and south-west of Banjul. The northernmost portion of the complex skirts the Kankujeri Road and includes Cape Creek. It encompasses the western shores of St Mary Island and extends to the south-east towards Lamin and Mandinari Village. It was declared a Ramsar site in February 2007. [2]
Eighty per cent of the Tanbi Wetland Complex is composed of mangrove forest which is made up of several species of mangroves, including Avicennia africana , Conocarpus erectus , Laguncularia racemosa , Annona glabra and Rhizophora spp., with the occasional baobab and Borassus aethiopum palm standing on the drier ground. The vegetation gradually changes to the west and south into bare flats, saltmarsh and dry woodland, with agricultural land encroaching around the fringes of the complex. There is a latticework of tidal creeks, known to locals as bolongs, as well as tidal lagoons and estuarial saline mudflats. [2]
The complex has a role in retaining incoming water and rainfall, stabilising the shoreline, the retention of sediments and nutrients, and also controlling their erosion, ground water replenishment and flood control; so the Tanbi Wetlands act as a hydrological buffer zone for the Banjul region. [3]
The complex is home to small monkeys, including troops of the western red colobus. Other mammals recorded include the West African manatee, marsh mongoose and African clawless otter. There are West African crocodiles as well as various snakes and lizards. It is an important breeding area for the shrimp Farfantepenaeus notialis . [3]
Over 360 species of bird have been recorded in the complex, including Pel’s fishing owls, brown-necked parrots, blue-bellied rollers and pygmy sunbirds; while in the northern winter Palearctic migrants such as ospreys and black-tailed godwits are found. The site has been designated an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International because it supports significant populations of western reef egrets, black-winged stilts, slender-billed and grey-headed gulls, and Caspian and royal terns. [4]
The main human activities in and around the complex are shrimp fishing, market gardening and the cultivation of rice. During the dry season, a small number of women from the Jola forage for, roast and sell oysters which they harvest from the mangroves; the oysters are cooked with firewood collected at the same time. [2]
Climate change and global warming pose a particular threat to wildlife in the wetlands as sea levels rise. [2] [5] In 2022, the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report included Tanbi Wetland Complex in the list of African natural heritage sites which would be threatened by flooding and coastal erosion by the end of the century, but only if climate change followed RCP 8.5, which is the scenario of high and continually increasing greenhouse gas emissions associated with the warming of over 4 °C., [6] and is no longer considered very likely. [7] [8] The other, more plausible scenarios result in lower warming levels and consequently lower sea level rise: yet, sea levels would continue to increase for about 10,000 years under all of them. [9] Even if the warming is limited to 1.5 °C, global sea level rise is still expected to exceed 2–3 m (7–10 ft) after 2000 years (and higher warming levels will see larger increases by then), consequently exceeding 2100 levels of sea level rise under RCP 8.5 (~0.75 m (2 ft) with a range of 0.5–1 m (2–3 ft)) well before the year 4000. [10]
Robben Island is an island in Table Bay, 6.9 kilometres (4.3 mi) west of the coast of Bloubergstrand, north of Cape Town, South Africa. It takes its name from the Dutch word for seals (robben), hence the Dutch/Afrikaans name Robbeneiland, which translates to Seal(s) Island.
The Casbah is the citadel of Algiers in Algeria and the traditional quarter clustered around it. In 1992, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) proclaimed Kasbah of Algiers a World Cultural Heritage Site, as "There are the remains of the citadel, old mosques and Ottoman-style palaces as well as the remains of a traditional urban structure associated with a deep-rooted sense of community."
Kerkouane or Kerkuane is the site of an ancient Punic city in north-eastern Tunisia, near Cape Bon. Kerkouane was one of the most important Punic cities, with Carthage, Hadrumetum, and Utica. This Phoenician city was probably abandoned during the First Punic War and was not rebuilt by the Romans. It had existed for almost 400 years.
Diawling National Park lies in south-west Mauritania around the Senegal River delta. The park is an important wildlife sanctuary.
Climate Change 2007, the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), was published in 2007 and is the fourth in a series of reports intended to assess scientific, technical and socio-economic information concerning climate change, its potential effects, and options for adaptation and mitigation. The report is the largest and most detailed summary of the climate change situation ever undertaken, produced by thousands of authors, editors, and reviewers from dozens of countries, citing over 6,000 peer-reviewed scientific studies. People from over 130 countries contributed to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, which took six years to produce. Contributors to AR4 included more than 2,500 scientific expert reviewers, more than 800 contributing authors, and more than 450 lead authors.
Bao BolongWetland Reserve is a protected area in The Gambia. Established in 1996, it covers 296.5 square kilometres.
The Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the fifth in a series of such reports and was completed in 2014. As had been the case in the past, the outline of the AR5 was developed through a scoping process which involved climate change experts from all relevant disciplines and users of IPCC reports, in particular representatives from governments. Governments and organizations involved in the Fourth Report were asked to submit comments and observations in writing with the submissions analysed by the panel. Projections in AR5 are based on "Representative Concentration Pathways" (RCPs). The RCPs are consistent with a wide range of possible changes in future anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Projected changes in global mean surface temperature and sea level are given in the main RCP article.
Kalissaye Avifaunal Reserve (KAR) is a small nature reserve in Senegal, located at the mouth of Kalissaye Pond in the middle of the Casamance River.
Saloum Delta National Park or Parc National du Delta du Saloum in Senegal, is a 760-square-kilometre (190,000-acre) national park. Established in 1976, it is situated within the Saloum Delta at the juncture of the Saloum River and the North Atlantic.
The Island of Saint-Louis is the historic part of the city of Saint-Louis in Senegal. In 2000, it was inscribed by the UNESCO on the World Heritage list.
A climate change scenario is a hypothetical future based on a "set of key driving forces". Scenarios explore the long-term effectiveness of mitigation and adaptation. Scenarios help to understand what the future may hold. They can show which decisions will have the most meaningful effects on mitigation and adaptation.
The Medina of Tunis is the medina quarter of Tunis, the capital of Tunisia. It has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979.
The Cacheu River Mangroves Natural Park is a national park situated on the Cacheu River in Guinea-Bissau. It was established on 1 December 2000. This site is 886 km2. The park has been designated as a Ramsar site since 2015.
The Songhor Lagoon is a coastal lagoon on the eastern coast of Ghana, West Africa. The site covers an area of 28,740 hectares, and it is located just outside the major town of Ada and to the west of the Volta River estuary. It was designated as Ramsar wetland site of international importance number 566 on June 22, 1988. In 2011, UNESCO approved the Songor Biosphere Reserve as part of the World Network of Biosphere Reserves. Among several other important functions, it acts as habitat and/or breeding ground for several notable species.
Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP) are climate change scenarios to project future greenhouse gas concentrations. These pathways describe future greenhouse gas concentrations and have been formally adopted by the IPCC. The pathways describe different climate change scenarios, all of which were considered possible depending on the amount of greenhouse gases (GHG) emitted in the years to come. The four RCPs – originally RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6, and RCP8.5 – are labelled after a possible range of radiative forcing values in the year 2100. The IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) began to use these four pathways for climate modeling and research in 2014. The higher values mean higher greenhouse gas emissions and therefore higher global surface temperatures and more pronounced effects of climate change. The lower RCP values, on the other hand, are more desirable for humans but would require more stringent climate change mitigation efforts to achieve them.
The Marromeu Game Reserve is a protected swath of 1,500 square kilometres (580 sq mi) of floodplain in the Zambezi, the only such area along the river. The reserve is characterized by vast grasslands and numerous rivers and streams. The African elephant, Lichtenstein's hartebeest, sable antelope, eland, burchell's zebra, hippopotamus, waterbuck, and reedbuck are all found there. Wild dogs, lions, leopards, cheetahs, and spotted hyenas are all predators. The Marromeu National Park is actively working to repopulate the area with buffalo after their population dwindled to 30,000. From the border of the buffalo reserve into the neighbouring Cheringoma highlands, a hunting concession of 8,252 square kilometres surrounds the Marromeu Complex, which consists of the 1,500-square-kilometer Marromeu Special Reserve. It was dedicated on 1 January 1969. It is located near Beira.
The Medina of Sousse is a Medina quarter in Sousse, Governorate of Sousse, Tunisia. Designated by the UNESCO a World Heritage Site in 1988, it is a typical example of the architecture of the early centuries of Islam in Maghreb. It encompasses a Kasbah, fortifications and the Great Mosque of Sousse. The Medina today houses the Archaeological Museum of Sousse. A number of Punic steles were discovered in the Medina, between the Ribat and the Great Mosque, in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Climate change in the Gambia is having impacts on the natural environment and people of The Gambia. Like other countries in West Africa, the impacts of climate change are expected to be varied and complex. Climate change adaptation is going to be important to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals in the country.
Climate change in Liberia causes many problems as Liberia is particularly vulnerable to climate change. Like many other countries in Africa, Liberia both faces existing environmental issues, as well as sustainable development challenges. Because of its location in Africa, it is vulnerable to extreme weather, the coastal effects of sea level rise, and changing water systems and water availability. Climate change is expected to severely impact the economy of Liberia, especially agriculture, fisheries, and forestry. Liberia has been an active participant in international and local policy changes related to climate change.
The Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) of the United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the sixth in a series of reports which assess the available scientific information on climate change. Three Working Groups covered the following topics: The Physical Science Basis (WGI); Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability (WGII); Mitigation of Climate Change (WGIII). Of these, the first study was published in 2021, the second report February 2022, and the third in April 2022. The final synthesis report was finished in March 2023. It includes a summary for policymakers and was the basis for the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28) in Dubai.
