Hydrological trends in Congo basin (Central Africa)

Abstract:

The last studies concerning some main Congo basin rivers allowed to subdivide their multi-annual flows into several homogeneous phases. As in West Africa, 1970 was the year of the major hydroclimatic event announcing a weaker flowing period.

In the absence of long, reliable and available flow series in the whole Congo basin of 3,8 10⁶km² area, the present study concerns only the Congo River at Brazzaville/Kinshasa and two of the main tributaries of its right bank, Ubangui at Bangui and Sangha at Ouesso, with hydrologic data available from the first half of the 20th century.

For Congo River, in comparison with its secular average, after an excess flow noted during the sixties, a significant drop of 10% occurs in the eighties. However, a return to normal conditions is recorded from 1995. For Ubangui and Sangha, the flows remain weaker since 1970.

Within the bi-modal hydrological regimes of Sangha and Congo river, because they are equatorial, we also observe since many years a small decline of the secondary flood of april-june. This phenomenon was emphasized especially these last years and is founded in others rivers of Central Africa, where it reflects the variations of de rainfall patterns and the surfaces features.

For the Congo basin, the situation is worrying because that affects the inland waterway transport. Moreover that wakes also the project of junction by a canal of the Congo and Chari basins for fighting against the hydrological decline of Lake Chad.