Advancing Forecasting, Research, and Integrated Collaboration for African Air Quality (AFRICA-AQ)

In Africa, more than 1 million deaths, annually, have been linked to air pollution-related diseases, with limitations in air pollution epidemiological data pointing to higher estimates. Rapid urbanization and industrialization, along with climate-driven extreme events will further exacerbate Africa’s current air quality problems through increases in anthropogenic gas-phase and particulate emissions, in addition to the natural emissions produced by vegetation, soil, forest fires, and dust, making air quality a continental priority. Africa is one of the most under-monitored and under-studied regions in the world, where the scarcity in observations brings large uncertainties to emission inventories, limits modeling capacity, introduces data gaps, and limits satellite validation. Several initiatives have identified an urgent need for a coordinated, Africa-led network, involving researchers and technicians for air quality analysis and forecasting, along with the establishment of a network of stakeholders who will actively participate and benefit from the air quality forecasting system. 

To mitigate the impacts of poor air quality on African communities and enable timely alerts and quick decision-making, a new international initiative called Advancing Forecasting, Research, and Integrated Collaboration for African Air Quality (AFRICA-AQ) has been established. AFRICA-AQ aims to develop a sustainable, Africa-led partnership that will strengthen the integration of air quality observations (e.g., ground-based, satellites, field campaigns) and emissions, as well as modeling and artificial intelligence efforts to enable African communities to develop and use a comprehensive and validated multi-scale air quality forecasting system covering the entire African continent. AFRICA-AQ has garnered interest from across the world with partners across Africa, the Americas, Europe, and Asia with wide ranges of expertise. AFRICA-AQ has initiated several working groups and connected with several on-going activities. A brief description of AFRICA-AQ, progress updates, and future work are provided in this presentation.