Africa Monthly and Dekadal Soil Moisture Anomalies in GeoTIFF

The African Center of Meteorological Applications for Development provides monthly and dekadal (10-day) Soil Moisture Anomaly (SMA) data for the African continent. This geospatial dataset measures root-zone soil moisture deviations from long-term climatological means to identify agricultural drought and fodder availability. The data is delivered in GeoTIFF format and was last updated in March 2026.

Use Cases

• Monitoring agricultural drought onset by analyzing SMA deviations in rainfed farming zones
• Assessing fodder availability for pastoralism using root-zone moisture surpluses or deficits
• Predicting potential crop yield reductions based on comparisons to the long-term climatological mean

Strengths

• Provides dekadal (10-day) temporal resolution for high-frequency monitoring
• Covers the entire African continent
• Uses root-zone soil moisture which accounts for evapotranspiration rather than just precipitation
• Distributed in standard GeoTIFF format for GIS compatibility

Limitations

• Derived from hydrological models and satellite assimilation rather than direct ground-sensor measurements
• Specific spatial resolution (pixel size) is not defined in the metadata

Provenance

Source

African Center of Meteorological Applications for Development

Collection Method

Hydrological modeling and satellite data assimilation

Freshness

Updated through March 2026.

Geography

Africa