“…As alluded to above, the position of a continent below a high pressure descending limb of an atmospheric Hadley Cell is a first order predictor of continental aridity and coastal upwelling between 15° and 30° latitude, notwithstanding significant but regional, transient, or smaller scale perturbations and trends (Etourneau et al, 2009;Heyman et al, 2004;Jung et al, 2014;Rommerskirchen et al, 2011;Shuster, 2006;Zhang, 2014). Africa currently straddles the descending limbs of both the northern and southern hemisphere Hadley cells, it has done so since it became defined as a continent, and it is the only continent with that distinction.…”