Analysis of the linkages between rainfall and land surface conditions in the West African monsoon through CMAP, ERS-WSC, and NOAA-AVHRR data

International audience; The European Remote Sensing Wind Scatterometer (ERS-WSC) backscattering coefficient, NOAA Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (NOAA-AVHRR) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and Climate Prediction Center Merged Analysis Precipitation ( CMAP) precipitation data sets are studied over the period August 1991 to December 2000 to document ( 1) the interannual and intra-annual evolutions of vegetation photosynthetic activity and soil-vegetation water content over West Africa and ( 2) their two-way links with precipitation. Over the Sahel, at interannual timescales the strongest relationships between vegetation, soil moisture, and precipitation are observed …