Editing IPCC:AR6/SR15/Chapter-3 (section)

==== 3.5.4.6 West Africa and the Sahel ====

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West Africa and the Sahel are ''likely'' to experience increases in the number of hot nights and longer and more frequent heatwaves even if the global temperature increase is constrained to 1.5°C, with further increases expected at 2°C of global warming and beyond (e.g., Weber et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1193|1193]]</sup> . Moreover, daily rainfall intensity and runoff is expected to increase ( ''low confidence'' ) towards 2°C and higher levels of global warming (Schleussner et al., 2016b; Weber et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1194|1194]]</sup> , with these changes also being relatively large compared to the projected changes at 1.5°C of warming. Moreover, increased risks are projected in terms of drought, particularly for the pre-monsoon season (Sylla et al., 2015) <sup>[[#fn:r1195|1195]]</sup> , with both rural and urban populations affected, and more so at 2°C of global warming as opposed to 1.5°C (Liu et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1196|1196]]</sup> . Based on a World Bank (2013) <sup>[[#fn:r1197|1197]]</sup> study for sub-Saharan Africa, a 1.5°C warming by 2030 might reduce the present maize cropping areas by 40%, rendering these areas no longer suitable for current cultivars. Substantial negative impacts are also projected for sorghum suitability in the western Sahel (Läderach et al., 2013; Sultan and Gaetani, 2016) <sup>[[#fn:r1198|1198]]</sup> . An increase in warming to 2°C by 2040 would result in further yield losses and damages to crops (i.e., maize, sorghum, wheat, millet, groundnut and cassava). Schleussner et al. (2016b) <sup>[[#fn:r1199|1199]]</sup> found consistently reduced impacts on crop yield for West Africa under 2°C compared to 1.5°C of global warming. There is ''medium confidence'' that vulnerabilities to water and food security in the African Sahel will be higher at 2°C compared to 1.5°C of global warming (Cheung et al., 2016a; Betts et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1200|1200]]</sup> , and at 2°C these vulnerabilities are expected to be worse ( ''high evidence'' ) (Sultan and Gaetani, 2016; Lehner et al., 2017; Betts et al., 2018; Byers et al., 2018; Rosenzweig et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1201|1201]]</sup> ''.'' Under global warming of more than 2°C, the western Sahel might experience the strongest drying and experience serious food security issues (Ahmed et al., 2015; Parkes et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1202|1202]]</sup> .

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