Traditional data sources are not sufficient for measuring the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. New and non-traditional sources of data are required. Citizen science is an emerging example of a non-traditional data source that is already making a contribution. In this Perspective, we present a roadmap that outlines how citizen science can be integrated into the formal Sustainable Development Goals reporting mechanisms. Success will require leadership from the United Nations, innovation from National Statistical Offices and focus from the citizen-science community to identify the indicators for which citizen science can make a real contribution.

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Citizen science and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

/pdf/rapid-decline-of-snow-and-ice-in-the-tropical-andes-impacts-2kaalvkwsf.pdf

Rapid decline of snow and ice in the tropical Andes – Impacts, uncertainties and challenges ahead

. We introduce the first catchment dataset for large sample studies
in Chile. This dataset includes 516 catchments; it covers particularly wide
latitude (17.8 to 55.0 ∘  S) and elevation (0 to 6993 m a.s.l.)
ranges, and it relies on multiple data sources (including ground data,
remote-sensed products and reanalyses) to characterise the hydroclimatic
conditions and landscape of a region where in situ measurements are scarce.
For each catchment, the dataset provides boundaries, daily streamflow records
and basin-averaged daily time series of precipitation (from one national and
three global datasets), maximum, minimum and mean temperatures, potential
evapotranspiration (PET; from two datasets), and snow water equivalent. We
calculated hydro-climatological indices using these time series, and
leveraged diverse data sources to extract topographic, geological and land
cover features. Relying on publicly available reservoirs and water rights
data for the country, we estimated the degree of anthropic intervention
within the catchments. To facilitate the use of this dataset and promote
common standards in large sample studies, we computed most catchment
attributes introduced by Addor et al. (2017) in their Catchment Attributes
and MEteorology for Large-sample Studies (CAMELS) dataset, and added several
others. We used the dataset presented here (named CAMELS-CL) to characterise regional
variations in hydroclimatic conditions over Chile and to explore how basin
behaviour is influenced by catchment attributes and water extractions.
Further, CAMELS-CL enabled us to analyse biases and uncertainties in
basin-wide precipitation and PET. The characterisation of catchment water
balances revealed large discrepancies between precipitation products in arid
regions and a systematic precipitation underestimation in headwater mountain
catchments (high elevations and steep slopes) over humid regions. We
evaluated PET products based on ground data and found a fairly good
performance of both products in humid regions ( r>0.91 ) and lower
correlation ( r ) in hyper-arid regions. Further, the satellite-based
PET showed a consistent overestimation of observation-based PET. Finally, we
explored local anomalies in catchment response by analysing the relationship
between hydrological signatures and an attribute characterising the level of
anthropic interventions. We showed that larger anthropic interventions are
correlated with lower than normal annual flows, runoff ratios, elasticity of
runoff with respect to precipitation, and flashiness of runoff, especially in
arid catchments. CAMELS-CL provides unprecedented information on catchments in a region
largely underrepresented in large sample studies. This effort is part of an
international initiative to create multi-national large sample datasets
freely available for the community. CAMELS-CL can be visualised from
 http://camels.cr2.cl and downloaded from https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.894885 .

/pdf/the-camels-cl-dataset-catchment-attributes-and-meteorology-15zzr5itbf.pdf

The CAMELS-CL dataset: catchment attributes and meteorology for large sample studies – Chile dataset

Spatio-temporal and cumulative effects of land use-land cover and climate change on two ecosystem services in the Colombian Andes.

http://spiral.imperial.ac.uk/bitstream/10044/1/64795/2/Bonnesoeur-etal-Accepted-EU_WEST_1-prod-s3-ucmdata-evise-05884572c6ff28c814d3707fd9c2d1cc-C_O4490789_1694490.pdf

Impacts of forests and forestation on hydrological services in the Andes: A systematic review

Changes in land use and land cover are major drivers of hydrological alteration in the tropical Andes. However, quantifying their impacts is fraught with difficulties because of the extreme diversity in meteorological boundary conditions, which contrasts strongly with the lack of knowledge about local hydrological processes. Although local studies have reduced data scarcity in certain regions, the complexity of the tropical Andes poses a big challenge to regional hydrological prediction. This study analyses data generated from a participatory monitoring network of 25 headwater catchments covering three of the major Andean biomes (paramo, jalca and puna) and links their hydrological responses to main types of human interventions (cultivation, afforestation and grazing). A paired catchment setup was implemented to evaluate the impacts of change using a ‘trading space-for-time’ approach. Catchments were selected based on regional representativeness and contrasting land use types. Precipitation and discharge have been monitored and analysed at high temporal resolution for a time period between 1 and 5 years. The observed catchment responses clearly reflect the extraordinarily wide spectrum of hydrological processes of the tropical Andes. They range from perennially humid paramos in Ecuador and northern Peru with extremely large specific discharge and baseflows, to highly seasonal, flashy catchments in the drier punas of southern Peru and Bolivia. The impacts of land use are similarly diverse and their magnitudes are a function of catchment properties, original and replacement vegetation and management type. Cultivation and afforestation consistently affect the entire range of discharges, particularly low flows. The impacts of grazing are more variable but have the largest effect on the catchment hydrological regulation. Overall, anthropogenic interventions result in increased streamflow variability and significant reductions in catchment regulation capacity and water yield, irrespective of the hydrological properties of the original biome. Copyright © 2016 The Authors. Hydrological Processes. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/hyp.10980

Sandro Arias

Papers

Impacts of land use on the hydrological response of tropical Andean catchments