News Stories

Solar Cooking in Africa

Dr John Marsham, Institute for Climate and Atmospheric Science in the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds is appointing an undergraduate to work on a summer studentship funded by Leeds Climate and Geohazard Services to create a climatology for solar cooking in Africa. more

Africa College contributes to new Parliamentary Report on "Home Grown Nutrition"

A UK Parliamentary Report into supporting and developing African agriculture and nutrition is published today on behalf of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Agriculture and Food for Development. Africa College is one of several organisations supporting the APPG. more

New research published on the relationship between pollinators of crops and natural enemies of crop pests.

New research by Africa College members looks at how the management of farms and agricultural landscapes impacts on both pollinators of crops and natural enemies of crop pests. more

Andy Dougill awarded Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellowship

Head of School for Earth and Environment, Professor Andy Dougill has been awarded a Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellowship to conduct research on 'Socio-environmental analyses of community carbon projects in Malawi and Zambia'. The Fellowship will be held over 24 months from September 1st, 2013. more

Africa College team to visit microfarm in Ethiopia

An interdisciplinary team from Africa College will be visiting Ethiopia in June 2013 to meet key stakeholders in the Northwest-Ethiopia Region and farming communities in Awi Zone, particularly in Fagita Lekoma district to scope collaborative multidisciplinary collaborative research and development projects on integrated smart micro-farming systems for sustainable health, food, and nutrition and income security in highly populated and degraded highlands of Ethiopia. more

Lindsay Stringer in the Toronto Star

Environmental social scientist Lindsay Stringer was interviewed in March 2013 for the Canadian newspaper The Toronto Star following Canada's withdrawal from the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, and interviewed again in April by the same newspaper for a feature article on desertification. more

Agricultural prediction using climate model ensembles

A special issue of the Journal Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, edited by Professor Andy Challinor, Africa College Research Director, focusses on Agricultural prediction using climate model ensembles.


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Two new European research projects for Africa College's Director of Research.

crop field
The project's name, Euporia, is fitting. In ancient Greek mythology, Euporia was one of the Horae (Goddesses of the seasons), whose dance was responsible for the alternation of the seasons. Euporia was associated with prosperity and plenty.

Andy Challinor and Suraje Dessai, School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, have been awarded over 1 million Euros for collaborative research on climate impacts and prediction services.

The School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds has been awarded over 1 million Euros in total for collaborating on two new European research projects on climate impacts and prediction services.

Andy Challinor, Africa College Research Director and Professor of Climate Impacts, and Suraje Dessai, Professor of Climate Change Adaptation are both collaborating on a 9 million Euro project funded by the Seventh European Framework Programme (FP7) and led by the UK Met Office. The project, EUropean Provision Of Regional Impact Assessment on a Seasonal-to-decadal timescale (EUPORIAS), aims to develop end-to-end climate impact prediction services, operating on seasonal to decadal (S2D) timescales, in order to demonstrate their value in informing decision-making, and to stimulate a market for these new tools and thus improve the resilience of society to climate variability and change.

Andy is also involved in a second and related EU FP7 project called Seasonal-to-decadal climate Prediction for the improvement of European Climate Services (SPECS). This collaborative project is coordinated by the Institut Catala de Ciencies del Clima in Barcelona, Spain. The 12M Euro project brings together six leading European forecast systems with a record in seasonal to decadal prediction, experienced European partners in the development of climate predictions and climate services, and a set of public and private stakeholders who strongly rely on the availability of climate information.

The project aims to identify the main problems in climate prediction and investigate a battery of solutions from a seamless perspective, spanning seasons to decades. SPECS will undertake research and dissemination activities to deliver a new generation of European climate forecast systems, with improved forecast quality and efficient regionalisation tools to produce reliable, local climate information over land at seasonal-to-decadal time scales, and provide an enhanced communication protocol and services to satisfy the climate information needs of a wide range of public and private stakeholders.

6th August 2012

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