SimOcean
Simulating and forecasting southern Africa's ocean

Projects

Locally, the importance of southern Africa oceans lies in its high productivity, particularly associated with the Benguela upwellling ecosystem on its west coast that sustains a successful fishing industry and supports local communities. On global and climate scales the leakage of the Agulhas Current into the Atlantic Ocean forms a key component of the global thermohaline circulation. The fact that southern Africa borders both a locally important eastern boundary upwelling ecosystem and a globally significant highly dynamic western boundary current system presents a unique natural laboratory, in terms of both ocean dynamics as well as biodiversity.

Modelling techniques are being used to research the scientifically bountiful oceans surrounding southern Africa and will help to identify southern Africa as a center of excellence in marine science with the potential to contribute significantly to global climate science.