Uganda getting warmer - report

A new climate report has shown that Uganda has been steadily warming for the past 40 years to date.
The report released by the Uganda National Meteorological Authority (UNMA) looks at Uganda’s climate from 1950-2023, where Uganda has been warming at the rate of around 2.6 degrees Celsius every 10 years.
The report reveals that the north and mid-western parts of the country are the most affected by decreasing trends in rainfall.
Additionally, the same report revealed that the cattle corridor was the warmest in 2023 (with a level of warming of 1.7 to 2.4 above the 1981-2010 long-term average).
The warning at the rate of 0.26˚C/decade (1950-2023) and 0.36 ˚C/decade (1990-2023), put the year 2023 the warmest on record.
The same report further revealed that in the last 33 years (1990-2023), mid-western Uganda has been warming faster than the South Western region of Uganda (0.6˚C/decade and 0.58˚C/decade respectively).
The report was authored by Prof Zi Lawrence Aribo, Dr Moses Ojara, Dr Godwin Ayesiga, and Dr Bob Alex Ogwang and it’s done annually to understand how the climate is changing over the years. These findings are fitted into the Africa State of Climate report which eventually gets its way into the Global State of Climate report.
Prof Aribo, who is the manager of Applied Meteorology and Climate Services at UNMA, said the mid-western region of Uganda is warming faster than the south western region.
What should government do?
The report implored the government to have initiatives with development partners to go into supplemental (small-scale) irrigations or irrigation schemes to support areas that are expected to have problems with water sources.
In areas likely to experience heavy rains, chances for flooding, diseases associated with heavy rains like malaria, and so on will increase within this season.
Therefore, health personnel should enhance surveillance of diseases, and stock the medical facilities so that they can contain such emerging issues in the future.
In terms of rainfall, this report looks at two seasons: March to May (MAM) and September to November (SON).
Trends of mean MAM seasonal rainfall over Uganda during the period 1981-2023 showed that Lake Victoria basin, parts of Eastern and southwestern Uganda, revealed positive trends, but only statistically significant over parts of Lake Victoria region.
 While speaking at the 5th sub-national seasonal rainfall outlook over western Uganda for September to December (SOND) 2024 last Friday in Mbarara, Prof Aribo, said the northern and mid-western parts of the country depicted negative trends in rainfall.
“In terms of rainfall, we realised that over that long period of time (1950-2023), the mid-western part of the western region has been experiencing a decreasing rainfall trend,” he added.
For MAM and SON (1981-2023) rainfall has been increasing over, parts of south western, eastern Uganda, and the Lake Victoria basin at the same time decreasing over parts of mid-western Uganda, and West Nile.
Key drivers
According to Prof Aribo, this trend of warming has been attributed to the total clearance of the vegetation cover.
A deforestation report of Uganda 2023, shows that Uganda has lost 41.6 percent of its forest cover in the last 100 years (1921-2021). In 1900, Uganda's forest cover stood at 54 percent, and by 2017, it stood at a miserable 12.4 percent.
This meant that there was consistent pressure on land for cultivation and settlement and increasing demand for wood fuel.
Mr Godfrey Mujuni, a weather expert with the Ministry of Water and Environment said the report findings are a good message to people that the rainfall is getting less than the previous years and the situation calls them to try to adjust their actions.
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