- Africa 2026
- Annex A
Methodology
How the edition was made: methods, the model card, the evidence cut and its age, the acceptance record and the glossary.
Contents
- ·Edition home
- ·Executive summary
- 1Africa’s risk travels through rivers, rains and power systems
- 2Key findings
- 3Systems and sectors at baseline
- 4Risks and capability
- 5Failed rainy season with power and food stress across eastern and southern Africa
- 6Readings from the other desks
- 7The 2027 agenda
- 8Systems in depth
- AMethodology
- BData appendix
- CReferences and record
- ·Complete edition, for print
A.1Methods
The regional baseline uses published values and four simple derivations. Each is shown in full so that any reader can reproduce it.
| No. | Derivation | Calculation | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| (1) | South Africa’s share of sub-Saharan Africa carbon dioxide emissions excluding land use, 2023 | 427.27 ÷ 871.01 | 49.1% |
| (2) | Kenya’s share of sub-Saharan Africa carbon dioxide emissions excluding land use, 2023 | 21.27 ÷ 871.01 | 2.4% |
| (3) | The three members’ share of sub-Saharan Africa population, 2024 | 138.94 ÷ 1,289.94 | 10.8% |
| (4) | South Africa’s electricity use per person against Kenya’s, 2022 | 3,404.6 ÷ 189.4 | 18.0 times |
| Strength | Definition |
|---|---|
| STRONG | a disruption in the source system has historically changed the target system’s service or output within one season, in more than one region |
| MODERATE | an effect is documented but buffered or slower |
| WEAK | an effect is plausible but not documented at regional scale |
| Label | Rule |
|---|---|
| Reported | value as issued by its source, with year |
| Inferred | reasoned from cited evidence; never a measurement |
| Estimated | Nexus analytical value with stated method |
| Scenario | conditional on stated assumptions |
| Expert input | structured editorial judgement awaiting evidence |
A.2Model card: Regional System Model v0
- Model ID
- MDL-AFR-REGIONAL · v0.1
- Purpose
- represent Africa as coupled water, energy, food, health and biodiversity systems across member countries, with forcing and transmission layers
- Family
- graph-based system of systems
- Inputs
- the cited sources of this edition; no proprietary data
- Method
- expert-specified coupling strengths (STRONG · MODERATE · WEAK) from assessments and analogue events
- Validation
- none yet, first validation against federation evidence in 2027
- Uncertainty
- qualitative; strengths are hypotheses, not measurements
- Domain of validity
- regional scale; not for national, basin or asset-level use
- Reproducibility
- strength table and sources published in this edition
20couplings
typed in v0
11strong
documented within one season
5moderate
documented, buffered
4weak
plausible, undocumented
A.3The baseline evidence cut
Every Nexus edition is published from a frozen evidence cut. The regional baseline cut is documentary: it pins the exact edition of every source cited. Federation cuts begin with the first national Foundry cuts in 2027.
- Cut ID
- NQ-REG-AFR-2026-Q0-1
- Type
- baseline documentary cut
- Resolution policy
- pinned · as of 30 September 2026
- Sources pinned
- 52 cited sources, each at the edition and access date in the references
- Model runs
- none at baseline, analytical values are stated with their method
- Digest
- computed at freeze and recorded in the publication record
- Supersedes
- nothing, first cut of the series
- Superseded by
- NQ-REG-AFR-2027-Q1-1 at the Q1 2027 close
Lineage
- 01
source edition
- 02
pinned citation
- 03
finding
- 04
page
- 05
publication record
| Element | Baseline 2026 | 2027 regional annual |
|---|---|---|
| Sources | cited publications, pinned by edition | national, regional and sector cuts through one graph |
| Analysis | stated methods and editorial estimates | typed analysis specifications |
| Models | Regional System Model v0 specification | model runs with receipts |
| Findings | twelve baseline findings | findings re-bound to federation evidence |
| Review | five passes scheduled | five passes on the exact digest |
A.4Evidence age and coverage
A 2026 edition rests on evidence observed in many different years. This page shows each time base, so that no single year label hides older evidence.
| Indicator | Observed | Released | Cadence | Next release |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Population, World Bank | 2024 | not recorded | annual | annual |
| Population, national offices | 2025 | Jul 2025 · Apr 2026 | annual | annual |
| Electricity access | 2023 | not recorded | annual | annual |
| Electricity per person | 2022 | not recorded | annual | annual |
| Carbon dioxide emissions | 2023 | not recorded | annual | annual |
| Freshwater withdrawal | 2022 | not recorded | annual | annual |
| State of the Climate in Africa | 2024 | May 2025 | annual | annual |
| Hunger report | 2024 | Jul 2025 | annual | annual |
| Eskom statements | 2025 to Sep 2026 | Aug 2025 · Sep 2026 | weekly | weekly |
| System | Coverage | Thinnest dimension |
|---|---|---|
| Climate and hazards | PARTIAL | losses by member |
| Energy | PARTIAL | generation mix after 2021; cross-border flows |
| Water | THIN | basin area and member shares |
| Food | PARTIAL | cereal output after 2023; food access |
| Health | THIN | heat deaths; cholera in Africa |
| Biodiversity | THIN | habitat condition |
| Finance | THIN | insured and uninsured losses |
| Digital | THIN | dependency mapping |
| Field | Source that would fill it | Blocker |
|---|---|---|
| Continental electricity access count for 2024, on one basis | IEA, World Bank and WHO Tracking SDG7 reports3649 | not opened; the figures found in search summaries differ across editions (about 590 million and 563 million in sub-Saharan Africa) |
| Electricity generation mix of Kenya, Senegal and South Africa after 2021 | Kenya National Bureau of Statistics, Kenya energy regulator, Senegal energy ministry, South African utility and regulator reports40 | the World Bank series stops at 2021; national releases were not opened |
| Cereal production for 2024 and 2025, by member | national agriculture ministries and FAO crop statistics | the World Bank series stops at 2023; no later release opened |
| Deaths and people affected by the Senegal floods of 2025 | humanitarian situation reports and the Senegal civil protection authority | no consolidated national figure found; results mixed 2025 and 2026 events |
| Kenya flood deaths and displacement for March to June 2024, from the situation report | humanitarian flash update on the Kenya floods39 | page returned an access error; figures seen in search summaries only |
| Insured and uninsured losses of the 2025 Eastern Cape floods | insurers’ associations and the national disaster management centre | not retrieved; only a local-authority repair estimate was seen in search summaries |
| Basin area and member shares of the Senegal River basin | Senegal River basin organisation30 | published areas range from about 270,000 to 483,200 km2 across secondary sources; no primary page read |
| Member shares of the Nile, Orange-Senqu and Limpopo basins | basin organisations and the Africa-wide water assessment32 | no source read |
| Heat-related deaths in any member country | national health ministries and peer-reviewed studies | not found at evidence close |
| Cholera cases and deaths in Africa for 2025 | WHO and Africa CDC situation reports26 | the WHO fact sheet opened gives global totals only |
| Renewable energy capacity of the three members for 2025 | IRENA Renewable Capacity Statistics 202637 | page returned an access error; press summaries give continental figures only |
| Member greenhouse gas emissions including land use | national inventories submitted to the UNFCCC | the World Bank series opened excludes land use |
| Capability rungs: early warning, reserves, response, recovery, social protection, infrastructure, workforce | meteorological services, civil protection, utilities and ministries | not reviewed by evidence close |
A.5Evidence cards: two anchor sources
Issued by the World Bank. Annual. Role: binds the access findings. The issuer models values from national surveys and utility data, and the sub-Saharan Africa group excludes North Africa.
EVD-AFR-001
Access to electricity, % of population4
Issued by the World Meteorological Organization. Annual. Role: binds the forcing and hazard findings. Figures are continental or sub-regional and are not separated by member.
EVD-AFR-002
State of the Climate in Africa 20241
| Dimension | EVD-AFR-001 | EVD-AFR-002 |
|---|---|---|
| Completeness | South Africa, Kenya and Senegal and the sub-Saharan Africa group | continental and sub-regional only |
| Timeliness | about 1 to 3 years after the reference year | about 5 months after the reference year |
| Revision | series revised by the issuer; not tracked here | one release per year |
| Method transparency | published methodology | published methodology |
| External validation | not assessed in this edition | not assessed in this edition |
Evidence cards to follow in Q1 2027
A.6Publication acceptance record
Editorial self-check at evidence close. Every applicable item carries a disposition; the remaining items are review, approval and deposit.
| Group | Area | Items | Pass | N/A | Pending |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| D1 | Identity and scope | 8 | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| D2 | Source and data | 12 | 9 | 1 | 2 |
| D3 | Analysis and models | 12 | 3 | 8 | 1 |
| D4 | Findings and claims | 9 | 8 | 0 | 1 |
| D5 | Figures, tables, maps | 10 | 6 | 2 | 2 |
| D6 | Editorial and citations | 10 | 8 | 0 | 2 |
| D7 | Review and approval | 13 | 0 | 0 | 13 |
| D8 | Artefact and design | 12 | 7 | 0 | 5 |
| D9 | Registry and release | 9 | 0 | 0 | 9 |
Publication gate
- Conditions met
- 14 of 23 at evidence close
- Blocking problems
- none recorded
- Open conditions
- reviews, approval of the exact digest, deposit, registry pointer
Not applicable at baseline
- Model runs
- first runs in Q1 2027
- Maps
- plates in Q2 2027
- Waivers
- none
A.7Status words
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Observed | Measured directly and published by the source. |
| Reported | Published statistics of an official or institutional source. |
| Declared | Stated by the body concerned; not independently measured. |
| Estimated | A Nexus estimate from cited evidence, with its method in Annex A. |
| Modelled | Produced by a stated model from cited inputs. |
| Inferred | Reasoned from cited evidence; not measured. |
| Forecast | A projection by the cited source. |
| Simulated | A simulation result under stated assumptions. |
| Scenario | A conditional statement under stated assumptions; never a prediction. |
| Expert input | Expert judgement, recorded with its basis. |
| Candidate | Proposed for a later edition; not yet evidence. |
| Evidence-quality levels (EQL 1 to 5) grade the source behind a value; they are not a score of the subject. | |
A.8How the edition is made, released and corrected
Every edition is built from a sealed evidence cut, reviewed under three keys, signed and deposited before any site shows it as published; corrections go to Nexus Standards as change proposals and feed the next cut.
| Step | What happens | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 01 Evidence arrives from the pillars | Foundry seals observations and indicator series, Universe hands over after-action and scenario findings, and contributions are screened at every gateway, including this site’s. | |
| 02 The cut is sealed | On the cut date the evidence is pinned under one identifier, so anyone can rebuild the edition from exactly what it was built on. | |
| 03 The edition is assembled | The edition is drafted from its template and content pack. Agents may draft; they never publish and never decide. | |
| 04 The keys turn | At the publisher of record the truth key comes first: every value is checked against its source or stated method before the meaning and capital keys turn. No edition moves on until every key has been turned by a named steward. | |
| 05 The gate opens | A named approver releases one exact digest of the edition; any change after this point is a new version, never a silent edit. | |
| 06 Signed and deposited | The PDF, the web edition and the data bundle are signed together with a manifest and an RO-Crate description, and deposited on Zenodo with a concept and a version DOI. | |
| 07 Published on its desk’s site | Only then does the edition show as published on its desk’s Reports site, and the Collection lists it as a part. | |
| 08 Corrections go to Standards | Method and correction findings go to Nexus Standards as change proposals; citations, corrections and new contributions feed the next evidence cut. |
A teaching model of the process, not a forecast and not a record of any run; dates and counts on this page come from the programme record. Sources: Reports governance at GCRI Canada (2026); Zenodo, repository of record for Reports deposits (2026).
Lifecycle, one state at a time: Draft, Computed, Evidence bound, Reviewed, Approved for release, Published, Corrected, Superseded. This edition is a draft.
A.9Glossary and abbreviations
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Baseline Edition | the inaugural annual edition that fixes the reference state for the series |
| WEFH+B | water, energy, food, health and biodiversity, the national nexus core |
| Coupling | a typed dependency through which one system transmits to another |
| Protection gap | the share of losses not covered by insurance |
| Capability ladder | LISTED → EXISTS → ADEQUATE → TESTED → DEMONSTRATED |
| EQL | evidence-quality level, 1–5 |
| Evidence cut | a frozen resolution of exact sources and versions |
| NNC · NLC · NWG | National Nexus Consortium · National Leadership Council · National Working Groups |
| Abbreviation | Expansion |
|---|---|
| AU | African Union |
| CDC | Centres for Disease Control and Prevention |
| EAF | energy availability factor |
| FAO | Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations |
| GTA | Greater Tortue Ahmeyim |
| IEA | International Energy Agency |
| IMF | International Monetary Fund |
| IRENA | International Renewable Energy Agency |
| LNG | liquefied natural gas |
| LULUCF | land use, land-use change and forestry |
| OMVS | Senegal River basin organisation |
| SDG | Sustainable Development Goal |
| WHO | World Health Organization |
| WMO | World Meteorological Organization |
A.10Technical annex
| Item | Annex | Contents | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| A.1 | Indicator definitions | the regional indicator set, with units and sources | IN THIS EDITION |
| A.2 | Coupling strengths | the twenty-cell matrix and its rationale | IN THIS EDITION |
| A.3 | Scenario specification | SCN-AFR-RAIN-01 assumptions and signposts | IN THIS EDITION |
| A.4 | Capability placements | rung evidence for fifteen functions | IN THIS EDITION |
| A.5 | Model diagnostics | first runs and validation | 2027 |
| A.6 | Sensitivity analyses | influence of coupling strengths | 2027 |
| A.7 | Member-country notes | atlas cards for every member country | Q2 2027 |
| A.8 | Review statements | pass-by-pass review record | AT RELEASE |
A.1 · indicator definition: carbon dioxide excluding land use
- Construct
- annual carbon dioxide emissions without land use, land-use change and forestry
- Unit
- Mt CO₂e
- Scope
- calendar year
- Source
- World Bank greenhouse gas series for carbon dioxide excluding land use6
- Revision
- revised by the issuer; not tracked here
- Known limits
- other gases and land use are not in the series
Notes
Numbers are the edition’s reference numbers, so a note reads the same in every chapter. The full list, with every source and its licence, is in Annex C. Annex C, references
- 36UNVERIFIED, not opened: International Energy Agency (ed.), Electricity access commentary, October 2025 (about 730 million people without electricity worldwide in 2024, sub-Saharan Africa about eight in ten, from search summaries; the page returned an access error). IEA, Paris. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 49UNVERIFIED, not opened: IEA, IRENA, UN Statistics Division, World Bank and WHO (eds.), Tracking SDG7: The Energy Progress Report 2026 (sub-Saharan Africa about 563 million without electricity, from search summaries). World Bank, Washington DC. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 40UNVERIFIED, not opened: Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (ed.), Economic Survey 2025 and 2026 (electricity generation by source; figures seen only in press summaries and not used). KNBS, Nairobi. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 39UNVERIFIED, not opened: UN OCHA (ed.), Kenya heavy rains and flooding, flash update 7 (19 June 2024; about 315 killed and 293,200 displaced between 1 March and 18 June 2024, from search summaries; the page returned an access error). OCHA, New York. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 30African Manager (ed.), OMVS: une capacité hydroélectrique de 400 MW (statement of the OMVS High Commissioner: Manantali 200 MW, Félou 60 MW, Gouina 140 MW; members Guinea, Mali, Mauritania, Senegal). African Manager, Casablanca. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 32Environmental Peacebuilding (ed.), State of Africa’s Environment: Transboundary tension (republication of an article of 15 September 2024; 63 basins, about 62% of land area, about 90% of surface water; the underlying report is not named on the page). Environmental Peacebuilding Association. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 26WHO (ed.), Cholera fact sheet (2025 global totals: 451,499 cases and 7,870 deaths reported by 47 countries; no African subtotal on the page). WHO, Geneva. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 37UNVERIFIED, not opened: International Renewable Energy Agency (ed.), Renewable Capacity Statistics 2026 (Africa added 11.3 GW in 2025, from press summaries; the page returned an access error). IRENA, Abu Dhabi. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 4World Bank (ed.), World Development Indicators, Access to electricity, % of population (EG.ELC.ACCS.ZS), South Africa, Kenya, Senegal and Sub-Saharan Africa, as served by the World Bank indicators interface on the access date. World Bank, Washington DC. Observation year 2023. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 1WMO (ed.), State of the Climate in Africa 2024 (press release and report page, published 12 May 2025: temperature, drought, cereal yields, floods, marine heatwaves). WMO, Geneva. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 51UNVERIFIED, not opened: S. Valadbaygi (ed.), Reports: The Foundational Edition, Volumes I and II. Reports series, Edition 2026–2030, V1.0. The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI) for the Nexus Consortium, Toronto, 2026. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 50S. Valadbaygi (ed.), Global Systems Risk & Resilience Report 2026: Baseline Edition (draft pack read as the structural base of this edition). GCRI for the Nexus Consortium, Toronto, 2026. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 6World Bank (ed.), World Development Indicators, Carbon dioxide emissions excluding LULUCF, Mt CO2e (EN.GHG.CO2.MT.CE.AR5), South Africa, Kenya, Senegal and Sub-Saharan Africa, as served by the World Bank indicators interface on the access date. World Bank, Washington DC. Observation year 2023. Accessed 2026-11-03.back