As part of the REgional Carbon Cycle Assessment and Processes Phase 2 (RECCAP2) project, we developed a comprehensive African Greenhouse gases (GHG) budget for the period 2010-2019 and compared it to the budget over the 1985-2009 (RECCAP1) period. We considered bottom-up process-based models, data-driven remotely sensed products, and national GHG inventories in comparison with top-down atmospheric inversions, accounting also for lateral fluxes. We incorporated emission estimates derived from novel methodologies for termites, herbivores, and fire, which are particularly important in Africa. We further constrained global woody biomass change products with high-quality regional observations. During the RECCAP2 period, Africa’s carbon sink capacity is decreasing, with net ecosystem exchange switching from a small sink of −0.61 ± 0.58 PgCyr−1 in RECCAP1 to a small source in RECCAP2 at 0.162 (-1.793/2.633) PgCyr-1. Net CO2 emissions estimated from bottom-up approaches were 1.588 (-6.461/11.439) PgCO2yr-1, net CH4 were 78.453 (36.665/59.677) TgCH4yr-1) and net N2O were 1.81 (1.716/2.239) TgN2Oyr-1. Top-down atmospheric inversions showed similar trends. LUC emissions increased, representing one of the largest contributions at 1.746 (0.841/2.651) PgCO2eq yr-1 to the African GHG budget and almost similar to emissions from fossil fuels at 1.743 (1.531/1.956) PgCO2eq yr-1, which also increased from RECCAP1. Additionally, wildfire emissions decreased, while fuelwood burning increased. For most component fluxes, uncertainty is large, highlighting the need for increased efforts to address Africa-specific data gaps. However, for RECCAP2, we improved our overall understanding of many of the important components of the African GHG budget that will assist to inform climate policy and action.

Quantifying how multiple ecosystem services and functions are affected by different drivers of Global Change is challenging. Particularly in African savanna regions, highly integrated land-use activities created a landscape mosaic with flows of multiple resources between land use types. A framework is needed that quantifies the effects of climate change, management and policy interventions on ecosystem services that are most relevant for rural communities, such as provision of food, feed, carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling and natural pest control. In spite of progress made in ecosystem modelling, data availability and stakeholder interactions, these elements have neither been brought together in an integrated framework, nor evaluated in the context of real-world problems. Here, we propose and outline such framework as developed by a multi-disciplinary research network, the Southern African Limpopo Landscapes network (SALLnet). Components of the framework such as the crop model APSIM and the vegetation model aDGVM2 had already been parameterized and evaluated using data sets from savanna regions of eastern, western and southern Africa, and were fine-tuned using novel data sets from Limpopo. A prototype of an agent-based farm household model was developed using comprehensive farm survey information from the Limpopo Province of South Africa. A first test of the functionality of the integrated framework has been performed for alternative policy interventions on smallholder crop-livestock systems. We discuss the versatile applicability of the framework, with a focus on smallholder landscapes in the savanna regions of southern Africa that are considered hotspots of global change impacts.