Western Indian Ocean Regional geo-spatial data on climatic drivers of change (DoC’s) in Marine Ecosystems

The overall objective of this project is to develop specific spatial data products at regional scale, for the coastal and/or marine areas of all the western Indian Ocean countries, including South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya, Somalia, Comoros, Seychelles, Madagascar, Mauritius and France. This report summarizes the data products, which have been prepared, on the basis of their relevance to the Large Marine Ecosystems (LME’s). The preparation of these data products involved retrieval from various sources, spatial analysis and modelling, and scaling. Effort has been made to standardize various data properties including spatial extent and formats.

These data include ocean climate related parameters including sea surface temperature, precipitation, wind velocity and the ultraviolet radiation; geomorphological parameters including the coastal watersheds and sol loss estimates and river discharge; ocean geophysical parameters including ocean colour and substances data (Chlrophyll a, Colored Dissolved Organic Matter and total suspended solids); and the coral and mangroves exposure to the drivers of change. The later two are a product of spatial modelling incorporating some of the data also included here. The spatial extent for the data does vary but as much as possible an effort was made to cover the western Indian Ocean continental and the island countries.

Here I briefly describe the data, the analysis and modelling procedures. Key citations for the data are provided. In addition, a spreadsheet with metadata has been prepared alongside this report. The naming convention is consistent, with the first letter (O, L, or M denoting Ocean, Land and Marine respectively, and the second letter (C=climate, G=geomorphological, E=Ecosystems, and M=management) denoting the data class.