Land/Ocean Interactions in the Coastal Zone of West and Central Africa

Salif Diop is a former Senior Water Officer in UNEP’s Division of Early Warning and Assessment (DEWA). He is a water specialist with extensive experience in various aspects of coastal oceanography, freshwater assessment, aquatic and marine issues, sustainable management, and development. He holds from University Louis Pasteur/Strasbourg/France, a 3rd cycle doctorate he defended in 1978 and a state doctorate he defended in 1986. He is a member of various expert and working groups, including numerous scientific and research institutions. As such, he spent his first sabbatical year as Senior Fulbright Fellow in the USA at the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences in 1986/87 - University of Miami/USA, Division of Biological and Living Resources. He has more than 40 referred publications with 5 books as main author and co-author and has been awarded a Nobel Peace Prize Certificate – IPCC 2007.

• 1. The Western and Central Africa land-sea interface: A vulnerable, threatened and important 2. West African coastal area: Challenges and outlook.- 3. Morphological and hydrodynamic changes in the lower estuary of the Senegal River: Effects on the environment of the breach of the “Langue de Barbarie sand spit in 2003.- 4. Management of a tropical river: impacts on the resilience of the Senegal river estuary.- 5. Combined uses of supervised classification and normalized difference vegetation index techniques to monitor land degradation in the saloum saline estuary.- 6. Studies and transactions on pollution assessment of the lagos lagoon system, Nigeria.- 7. Estuarine and ocean circulation dynamics in the Niger delta, Nigeria: implications for oil spill and pollution management.- 8. Morphological characteristics of the bonny and cross river (Calabar) estuaries in Nigeria: implications for navigation and environmental hazards.- 9. Status of large marine flagship faunal diversity within Cameroon estuaries of Central African coast.- 10. Morphology analysis of Niger delta shoreline & estuaries for ecotourism potential in Nigeria.- 11. Importance of mangrove litter production in the protection of Atlantic coastal forest of Cameroon and Ghana.- 12. Carbon budget in mangrove forests of varying degradation regimes in the western coastal wetlands complex (ramsar site 1017) of Southern Benin, West Africa.- 13. Rapid assessment of mangrove conditions for potential paymentfor ecosystem services in some estuaries of western region of Ghana, West Africa.- 14. Plantation agriculture as a driver of deforestation and degradation of Central African coastal estuarine forest landscape of South Western Cameroon.- 15. Assessment of mangrove carbon stocks in Cameroon, Gabon, the Republic of Congo (RoC) and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) including their potential for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+).- 16. Governing Through Networks: Working towards a sustainable management of West Africa’s coastal mangrove ecosystems.- 17. The importance of scientific knowledge as support to protection, conservation and management of West and Central African estuaries.