Rain, temperature, and sunshine conditions in Nigeria were close to average during the monitoring period. Among all the four ecological zones, the Sudan-Sahelian area had the largest increase in potential biomass (BIOMSS, +24%), resulting from a large increase in rainfall (RAIN, +26%). Considering biomass, only a slight change in biomass production potential occurred in both the Derived Savanna zone and the Humid Forest zone (BIOMSS, +1% and +3% respectively), as these two regions also had only limited changes in rain (RAIN, -4% and -2% respectively), temperature (-0.6°C and 0.0°C), and sunshine (+1% and -3% respectively) in the past few months. A 9% increase in BIOMSS was found for the Guinean Savanna. According to the value for the Cropped Arable Land Fraction (CALF), Nigeria crop land expanded 2 percentage point compared with the five-year average. The NDVI profiles show that most parts of the north were close to average, in an area where VCIx reached record values above 1. The only current area of concern is in the south and especially southwest (Osun, Oyo, Ekiti, covering about 6.5% of arable lands) where NDVI departs from average by more than -0.2. Altogether, crop condition is favorable, especially in the north.

Figure 3.22. Nigeria crop condition, Jan-Apr 2016

(a) Crop condition development graph based on NDVI

(b) Maximum VCI

(c) Spatial NDVI patterns compared to 5YA

(d) NDVI profiles