Soil maps of Benin: Cartes Pédologiques de Reconnaissance (1:200.000), ten sheets digitalized: Abomey, Bimbékéré, Djougou, Kandi, Karimana, Natitingou, Parakou, Porga, Porto-Novo, Save Map for entire Benin. Soil type descriptions are available, please ask S. Giertz. Parameter, Attribute list: soil type. Dataset created by IMPETUS subproject A2. The ten sheets were merged. Seperate sheets are downloadable as well.

The new maps, commissioned by the Africa Soil Information Services project (AfSIS), are important for studies on agricultural development, environment and food security. In Africa, significant amounts of soil nutrients are lost every year due to land degradation and soil exhaustion. However, improving land management is impossible without local information on soil properties such as sand-silt-clay content, water-holding capacity, or nutrient content. Unfortunately accurate soil information has been difficult to obtain for governments or research institutes, because existing soil profiles records are scattered over many sources. The aim of AfSIS, an international project funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, is to improve this situation, among others by creating up-to-date digital soil property maps at high spatial resolution. For further information see article: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0125814

This data is the result of collecting opinions of stakeholders on how they decide to use their land use products for generating benefits (food provision, fodder provision, energy provision, construction material provision and market value provision).

Average rainfall figures. Monthly measurements in mm/m2

This document describes the averages of Minimum and Maximum Temperatures in 2009 and the rainfall amounts recorded in the same year. Characteristics range between 2007 and 2009 and reflect the monthly temperature averages in Northern Benin. The utility of this document is that it informs in a short time the different variations of the climate in this northern part of Benin.

The majority of the people of West Africa are engaged in agriculture and related activities. As such, land is an important factor of agricultural production. But land scarcity and fragmentation in the wake of population growth, climatic variability and environmental deterioration have undermined large-scale agricultural production. This has worsened the poverty and food insecurity situation in the subregion. With migration as an integral feature of the socioeconomic dynamics of most societies, people have–apart from other responses–resorted to migration in search of fertile land and economic opportunities.