The AMMA-CATCH (http://www.amma-catch.org) densified meso-scale rain gages networks in Niger and Benin will provide daily rainfall over 2 1°x1° zone with a low measurements uncertainty (see their use to evaluate existing products in Roca et al, 2010 http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/2009JAMC2318.1). The Benin and Niger sites are representative of two different rainfall regimes, Sudanese (1200 mm/year) in the southern site and sahelien (600 mm/year) in the northern site where the performances of existing rain products have been shown to be different. A less densified network is also available in Mali, under sahelo-saharian regime and an even dryer and sandy soil environment.
This high quality reference complements the global or regional scale data set that are provided by operational networks, and allows an evaluation of the products at high spatial and temporal resolution. High resolution (1km X 5 minutes) rainfields based on the dynamical interpolation methods from Vischel et al (2010) (http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JHM-D-10-05015.1) will be generated for comparison with the MT instant rainrates.
These meso-scale networks are part of a densily instrumented hydro-météorological observatory with well equipped and well modelled watersheds, where the concept of hydrological or basin integrated validation of rainfall products can experimented. This will be an important focus for MT GV activities.