West Africa is a very vulnerable part of the world to the impacts of climate change due to a combination of exposure and low adaptive capacity. Climate change has induced an increase in rainfall variability which in turn has affected the availability of water resources, ecosystem services and agricultural production. To adapt to the increased aridity, farmers have used indigenous and modern coping strategies such as soil and water conservation techniques, the use of drought-tolerant crops and varieties, crop diversification, etc., and lately, climate information services (CIS).

Impact-based forecasting and warning services aim to bridge the gap between producers and users of warning information by connecting and increasing synergies between the components of effective early warning systems. We tested qualitatively whether a warning message based on colour codes is understandable and useful to trigger risk mitigation actions at the local level in the flood-exposed communities of Rajapur and Ghorjan unions in Sirajganj district, Bangladesh.

In this paper, satellite-based precipitation, clouds with infrared (IR) brightness temperature (BT), and tropical cyclone (TC) data from 2000 to 2015 are used to explore the relationship between precipitation, convective cloud, and TC intensity change in the Western North Pacific Ocean. An IR BT of 208 K was chosen as a threshold for deep convection based on different diurnal cycles of IR BT.

Mobile technologies could help to improve service delivery to smallholder farmers, but whether such services are fulfilling their potential remains poorly understood. To address this gap, this article presents an exploratory literature review regarding the impact of mobile phone-enabled services on farmers in developing countries. The review highlights a dearth of empirical evidence in this area. Findings suggest that farmers benefited through improvements in production planning, management of weather-related risks, and greater ease in receiving money.