Innovative data services for aquaculture, seismic resilience and drought adaptation in East Africa

在这份GCTA中，我们提出了三个项目，以应对东非地区发援国面临的重大环境挑战：地震、干旱和粮食安全。项目1将侧重于减轻马拉维的地震风险。在发援会国家，缺乏资源阻碍了有效的防震减灾战略，因此，地震可能导致毁灭性的人员和学校基础设施损失。马拉维是东非区域受这一挑战影响最大的国家之一。这是因为传统的砖石结构没有加固，地震脆弱，人口快速增长和城市化，东非裂谷(EAR)可能发生7.0级或更高的大地震。在马拉维，学校往往是村庄中唯一的社区建筑，在灾后用作避难所。除此之外，马拉维缺乏预测地震风险的手段。为了应对这一挑战，我们将采取双管齐下的方法。首先，我们将部署作为马拉维准备项目一部分开发的地震风险评估工具。这将使得能够可靠地评估地震危险性(即在给定的地理区域、给定的时间窗口内和具有一定的地面运动强度的情况下发生地震的概率)。第二，我们将翻译作为尼泊尔SAFER项目的一部分开发的简单、低成本、易于使用的工具，并将其与背景联系起来，以便对马拉维的校舍进行震前评估，并在知情的情况下确定加强学校的优先顺序。项目2将侧重于适应肯尼亚的干旱。严重缺水是东非地区最紧迫的发展挑战之一，自2000年以来遭受了10次干旱，导致3次严重饥荒，影响到数百万东非人。因此，迫切需要有关水资源的相关、及时和实用的信息，特别是对于远离决策中心的农村农牧人口。为此，我们建议开发一款应用程序。这款应用程序将为用户提供季节性缺水预测(土壤和地下水)，以及他们所在地区的不确定性估计，例如，农民可以对该季节的作物品种做出适当的决定。项目3将侧重于提高坦桑尼亚的水产养殖产量。坦桑尼亚的人口预计将从2018年的5600万增加到2050年的1.29亿，这将导致对鱼类蛋白的空前需求。为了满足日益增长的需求，养殖罗非鱼被提出来作为重要的解决方案。然而，它还没有根据需求进行扩张，获得适当的繁殖群体和教育被认为是限制扩张的关键问题。一个关键问题是入侵的小型罗非鱼物种(蓝点罗非鱼)对池塘的广泛污染，无法区分幼鱼和大型罗非鱼(例如尼罗罗非鱼)。坦桑尼亚政府已经认识到，消除这种污染是随着该行业的发展而提高粮食生产的关键一步。该项目将提供基于DNA的环境监测信息，将发展中的水产养殖部门的重点放在大型高产物种上，此外还将就从哪里获得纯种群以及受青睐的大型物种的适当饲料和饲养条件提供建议和信息。

In this GCTA we propose three projects to tackle significant environmental challenges; earthquakes, droughts and food security in DAC countries in the East African region. Project 1 will focus on seismic risk mitigation in Malawi. In DAC countries, the lack of resources hinders effective seismic mitigation strategies and as a result, earthquakes can result in devastating human and school infrastructure loss. Malawi is one of the countries in the East African region that suffer greatly from this challenge. This is because traditional masonry structures are unreinforced and seismically vulnerable, there is rapid population growth and urbanization, and large earthquakes of M7.0 or greater can occur in the East African Rift (EAR). In Malawi Schools are often the only community buildings in a village and are used as refuges post-disaster. In addition to that, Malawi lack the means to predict seismic risk. To tackle this challenge, we will employ a two-pronged approach. First, we will deploy the seismic risk assessment tools developed as part of the PREPARE project in Malawi. This will enable the reliable assessment of seismic hazard (i.e., the probability that an earthquake will occur in a given geographic area, within a given window of time, and with certain ground motion intensity). Second, we will translate and contextualise the simple, low cost, easy to use tool developed as part of the SAFER project in Nepal for the pre-earthquake assessment of school buildings and the informed prioritization of school strengthening in Malawi. PROJECT 2 will focus on adaptation to droughts in Kenya. Severe water shortage is one of the most pressing development challenges in the East African region, having been struck by 10 droughts since 2000 which led to three severe famines affecting millions of East Africans. As such there is a pressing need for relevant, timely, and practical information about water resources, particularly for rural agro-pastoral populations which are distant from decision-making centres. We propose to develop an App for this purpose. The App will provide users with seasonal forecasts of water scarcity (in the soil and groundwater) with uncertainty estimates at their location, allowing farmers to take appropriate decisions about crop variety for that season for example. PROJECT 3 will focus on improving aquaculture production in Tanzania. The population of Tanzania is projected to increase from 56 million in 2018 to 129 million by 2050, resulting in unprecedented demand for fish protein. Tilapia aquaculture is proposed as an important solution to meet the increased demand. However, it has not yet expanded in line with demand, with access to appropriate broodstock and education cited as key concerns limiting expansion. A key issue is the widespread contamination of ponds by an invasive small-bodied tilapia species (the blue-spotted tilapia), which is indistinguishable as young fish from large bodied species (e.g. Nile tilapia). Elimination of this contamination has been recognised by the Tanzanian Government as a critical step to improve food production as the industry expands. This project will provide environmental DNA-based surveillance information to focus the developing aquaculture sector on large-bodied, high-yielding species, in addition to providing advice and information on where to obtain pure stock and appropriate feed and rearing conditions for favoured large-bodied species.