1. Down-scaling with historical meteorological data Integrative Questions Land Cover Development of the most representative cover for linking to the climate model Net Primary Productivity - Climate Simulations What are the key factors driving the dynamics? What components of the climate-land use system appear to be tightly coupled and which loosely coupled? Is there hidden order within complexity that can be understood and described? Are the feedbacks between land use change and climate linear or non- linear? What interactions appear to have negative feedbacks? Positive feedbacks? Are there tipping points that cause one system to change state? What are the important spatial and temporal scales of interactions? To what degree does the climate response lag behind land use change, and vice versa? What are the important measures to consider when scaling up from case studies to the region? David J. Campbell, Jeffrey Andresen, Jennifer Olson, Jiajuo Qi, Nathan Moore, Gopal Alagarswamy, Dave Lusch – Dept. of Geography, MSU; Marianne Huebner – Dept. of Statistics & Probability, MSU; Bryan Pijanowski - Purdue University; Brent Lofgren and Tavares Ford – NOAA; Declan Conway and Clair Hanson – Univ of East Anglia; Ruth Doherty – Univ of Edinburgh; Jean Palutikof – Hadley Centre; Joseph Maitima, Robin Reid, Philip Thornton, - International Livestock Research Institute; Salome Misana and Pius Yanda – Univ. of Dar es Salaam; John Ng’ang’a – Univ. of Nairobi; Stephen Magezi – Met. Office, Uganda; Sam Mugisha – Makerere Univ. CLIP Project 202 Manly Miles Building Michigan State University East Lansing, MI 48824, USA http://clip.msu.edu Project Summary An important question in global change research is, what is the impact of human’s use of the land on the climate? Land use conversions such as deforestation and agricultural expansion alter soil moisture, surface reflectance and other land conditions that greatly affect local and regional climates. Similarly, changes in the climate, such as rising temperatures and rainfall variability, will impact agriculture and other land uses, leading to alterations in land use patterns. These processes are behind the project’s research question: What is the magnitude and nature of the interaction between land use and climate change at regional and local scales? This is being examined in East Africa, which is undergoing extremely rapid land use change including expansion of cropping into savannas, irrigation, deforestation and urbanization. The region straddles the equator and is characterized by a heterogeneous landscape from glaciated volcanoes and montane forests, to coffee, corn and banana farms, and wide expanses of semi-arid savanna. Institutions whose scientists are contributing expertise: Biocomplexity in the Environment Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems, Award #0308420 Climate–Land Interaction Project (CLIP) in East Africa Interim Report: Examples of Recent Activities Regional Climate Simulation Inner and outer domain of the regional climate model RAMS Ave. Temp., Jan. 1993 1 st atm level (49 m) Validating the model: RAMS vs. CRU gridded observations, Jan 1993 average temperature. Historical climate stations and synthetic weather series sites Long-term seasonal rainfall anomalies, Embu & Makindu, Kenya (1908-1990) Simulation of natural vegetation under different climate regimes, LPJ model Land Use Change Projections Land use change case study analysis Lower Embu (Mbeere), Kenya Expert Systems Workshops; Role Playing Simulations What will be the pattern of future land use? How will people respond to climate & NPP changes? Land surface paramaterization of the climate model Ground truthing with digital video from aircraft “CLIP cover” Hybrid Africover-GLC2000 Phenological curves of Leaf Area Index from MODIS satellite imagery for the land cover, Open Shrubs and Woody Vegetation Simulated rainfed maize yields, Embu and Makindu, Kenya, 1926-1998