Country

Benin: 4 ecoregions. Each with its climate now and toward 2050, and its conservation tier.

From the Gulf of Guinea northward, Benin runs through four Afrotropic ecoregions in sequence: the Eastern Guinean forests and a touch of the Nigerian lowland forests near the coast, the Guinean forest-savanna across the middle of the country, and the broad West Sudanian savanna in the north. That gradient, moist broadleaf forest giving way to seasonal savanna, is the whole climatic story: rainfall and the length of the wet season fall away with every degree of latitude. Three of the four ecoregions sit in the Nature Imperiled tier, reflecting how heavily this belt is farmed. For planting, the south supports humid-tropical trees and crops, while the north calls for drought-cycling savanna species, with fire and dry-season survival the design constraints.