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

==== 3.5.4.7 Southern Africa ====

<div id="section-3-5-4-7-block-1"></div>

The southern African region is projected to be a climate change hotspot in terms of both hot extremes (Figures 3.5 and 3.6) and drying (Figure 3.12). Indeed, temperatures have been rising in the subtropical regions of southern Africa at approximately twice the global rate over the last five decades (Engelbrecht et al., 2015) <sup>[[#fn:r1203|1203]]</sup> . Associated elevated warming of the regional land-based hot extremes has occurred (Section 3.3; Seneviratne et al., 2016) <sup>[[#fn:r1204|1204]]</sup> . Increases in the number of hot nights, as well as longer and more frequent heatwaves, are projected even if the global temperature increase is constrained to 1.5°C ( ''high confidence'' ), with further increases expected at 2°C of global warming and beyond ( ''high confidence'' ) (Weber et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1205|1205]]</sup> .

Moreover, southern Africa is ''likely'' to generally become drier with reduced water availability under low mitigation (Niang et al., 2014; Engelbrecht et al., 2015; Karl et al., 2015; James et al., 2017) <sup>[[#fn:r1206|1206]]</sup> , with this particular risk being prominent under 2°C of global warming and even under 1.5°C (Gerten et al., 2013) <sup>[[#fn:r1207|1207]]</sup> . Risks are significantly reduced, however, under 1.5°C of global warming compared to under higher levels (Schleussner et al., 2016b) <sup>[[#fn:r1208|1208]]</sup> . There are consistent and statistically significant increases in projected risks of increased meteorological drought in southern Africa at 2°C versus 1.5°C of warming ( ''medium confidence'' ). Despite the general rainfall reductions projected for southern Africa, daily rainfall intensities are expected to increase over much of the region ( ''medium confidence'' ), and increasingly so with higher levels of global warming. There is ''medium confidence'' that livestock in southern Africa will experience increased water stress under both 1.5°C and 2°C of global warming, with negative economic consequences (e.g., Boone et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1209|1209]]</sup> . The region is also projected to experience reduced maize, sorghum and cocoa cropping area suitability, as well as yield losses under 1.5°C of warming, with further decreases occurring towards 2°C of warming (World Bank, 2013) <sup>[[#fn:r1210|1210]]</sup> . Generally, there is ''high confidence'' that vulnerability to decreases in water and food availability is reduced at 1.5°C versus 2°C for southern Africa (Betts et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1211|1211]]</sup> , whilst at 2°C these are expected to be higher ( ''high confidence'' ) (Lehner et al., 2017; Betts et al., 2018; Byers et al., 2018; Rosenzweig et al., 2018) <sup>[[#fn:r1212|1212]]</sup> .

<div id="section-3-5-4-8"></div>

<span id="tropics"></span>