A perfect storm is brewing - and we can prevent it

by Pradeep Kurukulasuriya 

As we move further into the 21st century, all indications are that we will not only see increases in average temperatures, but also more frequent and more intense severe weather, changing rainfall patterns, droughts, floods and sea-level rise around the globe.

Just this month, the city of Jilin in China was severely flooded and more than 110,000 people had to be relocated, with 18 reported dead. The death toll from flooding caused by heavy rain in southern Japan has risen to at least 15. Just last week, a flood at a popular swimming hole in Arizona killed 9.

This threatens each and every single one of us. You might have read all about it in David Wallace-Wells´ recent piece in New York Magazine.

But preventing new and reducing existing climate risks in order to save lives, businesses, communities and countries, is one focus set out in the Sendai Framework, the world’s blueprint for dealing with disasters.

To understand climate change induced-disaster risk, you need the effective deployment of climate and weather monitoring technologies. The data generated from this technology needs to then be used with socio-economic, biophysical and other data to generate estimates of risks. The collection, packaging and distribution of this understanding of risk forms the backbone of early warning systems.

Taken together these “climate services” can save lives from fast-acting storms, protect livelihoods and infrastructure, and work to break the cycle of disaster-risk-and-recovery that forces developing nations to take reactive – rather than proactive – approaches when bad weather hits. This cycle means that all too often vulnerable communities need to start again from zero, infrastructure needs to be rebuilt, and funds need to be re-allocated from key areas that show promise of breaking the poverty cycle such as education and health.  

Unfortunately, this is a step that’s easier said than done. The problem does not only come from a need for better suited technologies, it also comes from challenges to maintain the equipment and the systems that need to be in place to monitor and understand risks, or even overlapping systems that don’t fit well together. Moreover, even if we to get that right, another common constraint is, for a variety of reasons, resistance to behavioral change. That can lead to knock on effects including limited information sharing, a fear of new technologies, new partnerships and new approaches.

Paradigms are not easily shifted.

This is why UNDP is supporting an ongoing dialogue on “A New Vision for Climate Services” that explores a shift in technology and a shift in approaches to ensure end-to-end climate services and their connected early warning systems are easily deployed, affordable, effective and built to last.

The creation of effective early warning systems requires connecting any number of parties and sectors to analyze and distribute actionable early warnings that vulnerable communities can use to get out of harm’s way, protect their goods, and build more climate-resilient livelihoods. The information chain for an early alert extends across National Met Authorities, Disaster Risk Agencies, various ministries, executive branches, the media, and the civil society. With improved, reliable weather information, this information chain can connect diverse sectors to inform improved disaster risk governance, and ultimately, save lives.

Decision makers can use this information to transform the community´s vulnerability into resilience by offering capacities to coping with extreme events such as invest significantly in infrastructure projects for water, energy, transport and flood mitigation. This will strengthen local economies, lower migration caused by climate change, and help build climate-smart infrastructure designed to withstand the risks due to a changing climate. Private sector enterprises can also use the information to inform their own climate adaptation strategies, while on the community level, people can develop climate-resilient strategies to improve local enterprises and protect productive assets.

What´s more investment in effective end-to-end climate services is smart business. The projected cost-benefit ratio is regularly cited as five-to-ten-fold for every dollar spent on climate services. Think about this - over the past three decades, floods and droughts have already cost Zambia $13.8 billion, equivalent to a 0.4 percent loss in annual economic growth.

This said, investments in climate services should not just fall on the public sector alone. While early warnings are an essential public good and a key component of disaster risk reduction, private enterprises certainly benefit from improved weather and climate information, which can be used to avoid crop losses and improve productivity on the farm, support energy and extractive industries, allow for weather insurance, and build responsive business prepared for the new climate realities of the 21st Century. In 2016, droughts, water scarcity and stricter environmental regulations cost businesses a reported $14 billion.

UNDP is working to connect private-sector enterprises with public-sector institutions across the globe in efforts to create integrated climate services. Think about the potential. Telecoms companies can create another revolution by sharing early warnings and improved weather information to mobile users, energy companies and decision makers can make better investments in large infrastructure projects, and, of course, vulnerable communities can make more money on the farm, save money to send their kids to school and the local clinic, and protect against the spread of vector-borne illnesses.

By supporting climate and weather intelligence among vulnerable communities, we can work to reduce the cycle of poverty.

It’s definitely a smart investment. The challenge will be creating the appropriate enabling environments and connected transformative change needed to deploy, monitor and maintain effective end-to-end climate services. In the end, climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction are inextricably linked. Improved resiliency on the farm, better decision making in the capital, and improved information sharing across economic sectors, all serve to reduce risks, take proactive steps toward disaster preparation, and avoid for humans to become an endangered species. 

Pradeep Kurukulasuriya is head of climate change adaptation at the Global Environmental Finance Unit, Bureau for Policy and Programme Support, United Nations Development Programme.


This piece also appeared in Thomson Reuters  under the following link http://news.trust.org/item/20170726150028-zqprc

Let the negotiations begin: How met agencies can share revenues generated by private sector companies

By Anthony Mills

We all know that good data – and an improved understanding of the market – makes for good decisions. In order to understand the nuanced intricacies of the weather services market – and potential revenue streams that could be generated through agreements with private-sector companies – we decided to look at what the data told us. This meant taking on a major cross-continental market study to better understand the market for such services, its pitfalls, potentials, challenges and opportunities.

The need for such market data and information was clear. In an earlier blog post, I wrote that “More information…is needed on how meteorological agencies can commercialize part of their operations and on how met agencies can add value to their existing information so that it can be sold.

“Questions also exist regarding the use of potential income streams and on whether these would be enough to help agencies maintain and expand their operations. Can mechanisms enabling the flow of funds from the aviation sector to met agencies form a useful precedent? Could mobile phone companies perhaps pay met agencies for valuable and highly tailored information that could then be distributed to their users?”

This questions were followed up with a simple conclusion. “[We] need to establish how the new services that [the met agencies] will be providing can generate revenue streams for the long-term maintenance of the new as well as the existing met equipment and technology.” 

More than a year has passed since this text above was written, and the good news is that the information required is now available. This is because CIRDA commissioned a market study on how the met agencies can capitalize on private-sector opportunities and find mechanisms to increase revenue streams. The results of this study are detailed in an the UNDP’s new Climate and Weather Services Market Assessment - Revenue Generating Opportunities Through Tailored Weather Information Products. 

The extensive report, made possible with financing from the Global Environment Facility's Least Developed Countries Fund, is over 100 pages long. For a snapshot, take a look at the summary. In this blog-post I give you the findings of the study in a nutshell, and in a more informal manner than you will find in the technical report.

A True Market Opportunity

The main finding shining out of the market study was that the met agencies have a remarkable opportunity to be part of a growing, dynamic, large and powerful private-sector market based on tailored weather information products.

In recent decades the availability, diversity, sophistication and use of weather information products generated by private-sector companies has skyrocketed. These companies are increasingly using satellite data to generate their products, but they are always on the look-out to refine their products by using local weather data collected from the ground.

The risk facing the met agencies is that these private companies do not depend on the met agency data for their commercial viability; the data from met agencies is just a “nice thing to have.” Business will go on for these companies, with or without the met agencies. In time, as the private companies get used to running their operations without the met agencies, it is likely to be harder to forge partnerships in the future. Consequently, now is the time for met agencies to seize the opportunity to partner with the private companies.

The weather information market in Africa is still fresh and dynamic. There are gaps to be seized. There are profits to be generated through innovative approaches like the new apps developed at the recent Climate Action Hackathon.

At the moment, accurate, consistent data from on-the-ground met agency weather stations do have value for private weather services companies. Such data can increase the quality of the weather information products, enabling them to charge their customers more.

The private companies will consequently be prepared to share in revenue streams with the met agencies, which in turn increases the long-term financing prospects for the met agencies. Indeed, the global weather information companies aWhere and Speedwell Weather both publically stated their commitments to forging partnerships with African met services at the CIRDA Last Mile Workshop, held March 2016 in Livingstone, Zambia. Both companies agreed that shared revenue streams – as is for example already happening in Brazil – were an option on the table if the data provided by the met agencies was consistent and accurate. It was also noted that the value of the data from the met agencies would be greater if the data from several countries could be pooled together.

Making It Work

Another finding emerging from the study was that generating profits from tailored weather information products is not a straight forward exercise. Like any business, there needs to be a steely focus, a gritty determination, a commitment to extreme quality, laser-like attention to detail, strong skills in technology, marketing and business development, large doses of innovation, a fleet-footed flexibility, and last but not least considerable patience.

It takes many years of time, joules of human energy and millions of dollars to transform the initial idea of the weather information product into a profit-generating revenue stream. In short, this is not for the faint-hearted. Only companies with strong human resources, deep pockets and a lively entrepreneurial mind-set will cut the mustard in this arena.

Take WeatherNews for example: they started out in 1986 in Japan, and today have a staff of over 700 scattered across the world. They specialize in providing tailored weather information to assist businesses in planning their operations. If you are a mining business, or a construction business or a shipping business, for example, you need to know when the storm will hit so that your operations can be adjusted accordingly. It is certainly worth your while paying WeatherNews a lot of money if they provide you with weather information on an hourly basis that you can rely on. Large savings can be made for the customers. WeatherNews of course trades on this. Last year it made US$33 million gross profit.

Companies like WeatherNews are always open to improving their products to increase their profits. This is where met agencies have an “in.” If the met agencies were to provide their data for a relatively low cost (or even for free) to such companies, there are potentially large returns to be gained via revenue-sharing with the companies.

Of course, the met agencies will need to negotiate hard for a fair share of the proceeds, and expert advice will almost certainly be required for such discussions. This is because determining what is “fair” requires a detailed understanding of the weather information market.

If you are wanting to buy a house for example, it is very unlikely that the seller will accept your offer if you come in at 20% of the market value. Met agencies need to do their homework to work out what the market value of their data is on the international market as well as national market, and walk into the negotiations well prepared.

Other steps that the met agencies will potentially need to take prior to stepping into the ring with the private companies include: ensuring that the national legislation allows for revenue-sharing contracts between weather companies and the met agency; expanding their ground observation network to provide sufficient coverage of the country to entice the private companies; and importantly ensuring that they can guarantee consistent and accurate data to the companies.

The met agencies can take heart that they are holding a lot of trump cards when walking into the private company board rooms. They have, for example, archived historical data that is of some value. But the value of historical data is negligible compared with future potential data.

The real trump card the met agencies are holding is that they have a lot of infrastructure on the ground that can generate data that will improve the weather information products in the private sector for many years to come. In this regard: the more data from the ground the better.

One low-hanging fruit for the met agencies is to capitalize on the huge investments that cell phone companies have made into infrastructure across their countries. At each cell phone tower there is electrical power, a strong mobile phone signal for transmitting data, and a sturdy barbed wire fence to protect the equipment. These are the ideal sites for – with relatively little investment – expanding the ground observation network of automatic weather stations and greatly increasing the amount of data to provide to private companies.

The mobile phone towers will affect the data slightly; the tower may for example block the rain from entering a rain gauge for example. But the effects have been shown to be minor and easily corrected. Private companies are certainly going to see tremendous value in such data.

So my parting message to African met agencies is: invest on your mobile phone towers and let the negotiations begin!

Dr. Anthony Mills is the CEO of C4 EcoSolutions – a company of 15 climate change consultants that develop innovative, evidence-based solutions for adapting to climate change. C4 operates in more than forty countries across Asia and Africa. The company’s clients include the International Finance Corporation (IFC), UNEP, IFAD, FAO, CarbonPlus Capital and UNDP.  C4’s work includes designing and implementing adaptation projects and investments in both the public and private sectors. Anthony is also Extraordinary Professor in the Department of Soil Science, University of Stellenbosch. 

Climate Action Hackathon Connects Innovation, Ideas, People and Technology

Hackathon Works To Provide Weather Information to Vulnerable Communities in Africa  
By Joost Hoedjes

Weather and climate information doesn’t reach Africa’s most vulnerable communities. There’s no weather channel, very limited early warning systems, and limited capacity in National Hydro-Meteorological Services (NHMS) to create rich targeted packages that could reach end-users.

In response to this problem, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) dedicated a multi-national conference in Livingstone, Zambia, (15-17 March 2016) to the subject of  “The Last Mile” – that is how we can package and share weather information to reach end-users. Experts from around the world came to present strategies on data packaging, communications and smart innovative ways to address this.

In a notable side event, UNDP partnered with the Brown Institute for Media Innovations – a bi-coastal collaboration between Stanford’s School of Engineering and Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism – and the International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI) to create a Hackathon.

The idea for this was born one cold spring night last year over dinner in an Irish pub in New York. As my UNDP colleagues and I were struggling with these very challenges, one thing was clear: innovative thinking would be needed to turn raw data into user-focused information products that could actually reach end users in a meaningful and impactful way. After the nth pint of Goodness, we figured we'd solved it. The Climate Action Hackathon. Let's get a group of talented developers in a room together, provide them with the type of data most NHMSs have, and see the ideas they come up with to this challenge. 

We had a total of 117 applications. There were applicants from across sub-Saharan Africa, from New York City, India, Turkey, Italy, China and Oxford. It was an amazingly ambitious and skilled pool of young talent. Africa’s challenges require home-grown solutions, and we were thrilled that so many Africans applied. In an industry regularly dominated by men, we also had a strong female contingent, meaning a diversity of perspectives, backgrounds, skills and interests. For the top 25 applicants, travel scholarships to Livingstone were offered by the UNDP Programme on Climate Information for Resilient Development in Africa (CIRDA).

The first challenge was to give them a crash course on meteorology, hydrology and the challenges National Met Services in Africa face. Country presentations gave the participants insights into the needs, roadblocks and challenges that NHMS encounter. Presentations from international experts, NHMS and practitioners showed them possible ways forward, as did a Project Brief we shared with participants on our Slack and Github developer platforms.

It’s not enough to just have a bunch of smart and energetic kids with a decent internet connection. They need data! Data experts and representatives from data providers, such as IRI, aWhere Weather, Earth Networks, UBIMET, GEONETCast and the Zambia Meteorological Department were on hand to answer the developers' questions. Crucially, most of these provided their APIs for the developers to use, giving them the kind of data and information a typical NHMS will have at its disposal. 

The developers, who were grouped into five teams, were given 27 hours to develop and present a prototype of their application. During these 27 hours, there was a lot of interaction between the developers and the data providers, practitioners and experts. All of the teams were still coding away long past midnight, and a number of developers continued through the night, working to meet the 11:30 deadline. 

See a live beta Extend Dashboard at http://extend.getforge.io/.

The skills, motivation and drive of the participants, resulted in five very useful, realistic and pragmatic applications. One app used simple design and processes to provide farmers with a call-in mobile app that provided real-time weather information voice messages in local languages.  Other applications included a visualization and risk-management app that agricultural extension workers could use to easily analyze weather data; a mapping app that African pastoralists could connect with to avoid hazards such as floods and wildfire; and a text app that would allow agricultural extension agents to register farmers to receive tailored texts on weather conditions.  

It's amazing to feel the kind of enthusiasm for weather and climate information services that we've experienced during the Hackathon. And even more amazing to realize that most of the applications that were developed can be implemented by NHMS. Although the on-site event has ended, the Climate Action Hackathon will continue online until the 1st of June. After that, together with our country partners, we will help put the best ideas into practice.

Reflections from the Hackers
Climar
“We were also surprised by the level of diversity in terms of skills and experience in our team, ranging from a coding expert, educator, GIS expert and business expert, to a climatologist as well as practitioner in climate change adaptation.” Teddy – Climar Team Member. The Climar Project is a climate information sharing platform that provides tailored advice to different sectors of the economy with recorded information in local languages. 

The Knife’s Edge (Extend)
“The UNDP CIRDA Hackathon was an incredibly enabling environment for developing tools for climate and weather. The hackathon was well organized in terms of both the logistics and providing the relevant datasets and expert access, and it was great meeting and learning from the different stakeholders involved with the challenges described at the conference.” – Madi-Jimba Yahya, Knife’s Edge Team Member. The Knife’s Edge Team Extend Project worked to improve climate and weather information transfer to Agricultural Extension Officers in order to improve decision making by farmers.

Symbolic text tells you when to water.

Climate Frame

“ClimateFrame is a framework that allows local experts to frame data by defining specific actions that are executed when certain events occur within real time data.” Climate Frame Team Member, Naomi Pentrel. Climate Frame also worked with Extension Officers, adding a simple text message that would allow illiterate farmers to know when to plant and water via symbolic text messages sent over SMS. 

The Farmers’ Guide Project
“Due to the changing climatic conditions, there has been a shift in the planting seasons and weather patterns. This has rendered traditional methods of estimating start of season untenable. This has caused farmers, sometimes, to miss out on planting seasons.” – Elvis Bando, Farmers Guide Team Member. This project works to provide farmers with improved information on when to plant and how to maximize profits and productivity.

The GitHub backend allows hackers to connect across the globe.

The #mLisho Project
“Nomadic pastoral systems are intrinsically able to adapt to fluctuating and extreme climates provided they have prior sufficient information to guide their movements in search of better grazing grounds for their livestock. Lack of information has led to a loss of livestock and - substantial changes to the social system of the nomadic pastoralist.”  Robert Ouko, mLisho Team Member. The mLisho Project created a basic early warning system platform that uses a mobile phone SMS API to send sustainability and market information to nomadic pastoralists based on predictions of range land productivity and market studies.

Resources

• Read project proposals, briefs and see product introductions online in the Climate Action Hackathon Blog
• Hackathon Overview
• Project Brief

Joost Hoedjes is a Country Support Specialist on Hydrology for UNDP’s Programme on Climate Information for Resilient Development in Africa (CIRDA), which supports Climate Information and Early-Warning Systems Projects in 11 of Africa’s Least Developed Countries in their missions to save lives and improve livelihoods.

Applying Climate Information to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals

By Bonizella Biagini

Information is a cross-cutter. It can be applied to almost everything. And improving climate information and early warning systems across Africa has the potential to significantly improve lives, build resiliency and support us in our global efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

For over 30 years, the international development community has made substantial investments in climate information systems for Africa, nevertheless, according to the World Bank, “most hydromet services are unable to meet the needs for weather and climate information.” This lack of quality information is costing African nations dearly.  With effectively structured public-private partnerships, new low-cost technology advances such as Automatic Weather Stations, cloud computing and automated emergency warning systems, strengthened institutions, increased regional cooperation and continued capacity building, sustainable climate and weather information solutions are a realistic and attainable goal. Reaching this target could have a significant impact on our ability to protect human life, build resiliency in the face of a changing climate, and foster long-term prosperity.

Providing vulnerable farmers and communities with improved weather and climate information has the potential to increase farm production, build market stealth and lower risk. With better information on extreme weather events, improved crop forecasts and more actionable information on what to do when bad weather hits, farmers can protect property and human lives, access risk-management mechanisms like index-based insurance, and create long-term plans for a future that will be highly dependent on rainfall patterns, droughts, floods and other natural disasters. Decision makers can use this valuable information to inform National Adaptation Plans, strengthen national production, lower migration caused by climate change, and build climate-smart infrastructure designed to withstand the potential dangers a changing climate.

So how can African leaders apply climate information and early warning systems to the SDGs? It’s about embracing innovation, learning from the past and supporting enabling actions that build to a more sustainable future for investments in the climate services sector.

Applying Climate Services to the SDGs

No Poverty

Through the Millennium Development Goals, Africa’s Least Developed Countries have achieved significant gains in addressing poverty traps and building the institutions and infrastructure necessary for long-term sustainability. But we have a long way to go, and information is going to be essential in breaking the poverty cycle.   

Globally, weather impact caused 1.94 million deaths and resulted in an estimated US$2.4 trillion in economic losses between 1970 and 2012. Over the past three decades, floods and droughts have already cost Zambia $13.8 billion, equivalent to a 0.4 percent loss in annual economic growth. This astonishing figure could be significantly reduced if proper weather and climate information systems are established, along with the long-term visions, capacity building and support needed to ensure initial investments in infrastructure and technology are sustainable. 

The technological basis for this new vision is founded on relatively recent innovations in hydro-meteorological observation and forecasting technologies, as well as advances in telecommunication services and computing, which are rapidly spreading across the continent.  The emergence and combination of these technologies enable the deployment of dense arrays of low-cost weather and climate monitoring sensors onto cellular communications towers into areas that were previously too difficult or costly to reach.   

With the necessary power, telecommunications, and security services in place to ensure the safe and continuous operation of this equipment, National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHS) in sub-Saharan Africa can place a greater emphasis on the interpretation and transmission of life-saving information to the public, rather than making manual observations or attempting to fix far more costly and difficult to maintain traditional radar systems. By engaging with a number of new actors in this space, they also have the opportunity to create new partnerships with the private sector to improve the quality of weather information, share weather alerts and build revenue streams through the sale of data to industries with vested interest in the weather, such as aviation, banking and mineral extraction. 

Zero Hunger  

There will be about 2 billion extra mouths to feed by 2050 if population trends continue. This means we are going to need to find innovative solutions to boost crop productivity while ensuring we are aligning with best practices to protect the environment. Not an easy task, but better weather information could aid in these efforts. 

Consider this, about 25 to 40 percent of the food produced in Africa is lost because of inadequate harvest, storage and transport practices. If farmers are given relevant weather information they need to plant, harvest and hit the market at the right time, not only could they improve their incomes, they could also increase production levels to meet our growing food needs. Additionally, by providing early warning systems, African nations have the opportunity to mitigate the affects of natural disasters, which sap national resources and hinder food security initiatives.  If global warming continues at the current rate, sub-Saharan Africa could see a 5 to 22 percent drop in crop production levels by 2050. Knowing the weather will be essential to the continent’s most vulnerable farmers in building systems and methodologies that are resilient to increased chances of drought and erratic rains.

 

Good Health and Well-Being

Early-warning systems, especially lightning detection, can save lives. Lightning is one of the number-one weather-related dangers for villagers living in rural Africa. The region receives more lightning strikes than anywhere else in the world, and poorly designed buildings and a general lack of awareness of what to do when lightning strikes only adds to the risk.  

Death numbers from lightning strikes in Africa are similar to what they were in the developed world over a hundred years ago - before the Industrial Revolution and rapid urbanization dropped death tolls in places like the United States from around 400 a year to just 30 today.  Initiatives like the UNDP Programme on Climate Information for Resilient Development in Africa (CIRDA) and the Severe Weather Nowcasting Based on Total Lightning Detection in Africa’s Lake Victoria Region are working with African countries to deploy low-cost lightning detection systems that can aid in the issuance of life-saving alerts. 

 

And what about mosquito-born disease? Since 2000, nearly 700 million cases of malaria have been prevented in Africa and death rates have fallen 60 percent globally. But changing weather patterns increase the risk of malaria outbreaks, and actionable information would help policy makers protect programs that have aided in slowing its spread. On the village level, if poor rural people had better weather information, they would know when it’s time to spray for bugs and sleep under nets. 

Quality Education

Of course improved productivity and reduced risk means school-age children will have better access to long-term education opportunities. It’s easier to stay in school if you are not fleeing drought zones and floods, or returning to the farm to rebuild after a flash flood. There are also innovative ways in which climate information is being coupled with education to support education in science, technology, engineering and math. In March 2015, the Trans-African Hydro-Meteorological Observatory (TAHMO) installed a weather station at a high school near the coast of Lake Victoria as part of their School-2-School Programme. The students there will be comparing data with a sister school in Idaho, USA. This not only supports accurate, real-time weather data-gathering, but also helps build a next generation of scientists, and raises awareness of climate change and environmental stewardship.

Gender Equality

How do the genders use climate information differently? While men may look to the information to avoid dying while out fishing on Lake Victoria – where an estimated 5,000 people die each year due to erratic weather – women use and process the information differently. For instance, women may be in charge of marketing food, and can choose to hit markets at optimal price points. They are generally in charge of family health, and knowing what weather will come can help them feed, protect and nourish their children to keep them out of harms way and build healthier lives. There’s also a peace of mind that comes with knowing the weather. And knowing what the weather will bring can foster a safer home environment. 

Clean Water and Sanitation

Floods, droughts and other weather shocks can wipe out entire sanitation systems, effectively putting us back to square one. With better information, policy makers can plan around changing climate patterns, build resilient systems that withstand these shocks and protect clean water sources through the effective monitoring of rainfall and other hydrological activity.

Affordable and Clean Energy

Weather information has a huge impact on the energy industry. For instance, water flows affect dam production, wind direction, speed and consistency affect wind production and the sun, well… it affects solar production. Effectively looking both at short-term forecasts and long-term trends will empower decision makers in building sustainable energy systems, increasing output and building smarter energy grids that adapt to energy needs.

Decent Work and Economic Growth

Not only can smallholder farmers, pastoralists and rural entrepreneurs use weather information to build crop efficiency and optimize market potential, it is also a game changer for large industries such as banking, insurance, telecommunications, tourism, natural resource exploitation, and any number of related industries.

Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure

If you know the weather, you can create index-based insurance that protects agricultural production – both large and small – along with larger infrastructure projects. More importantly, better information works to increase production and market knowledge and stealth, while at the same time decreasing risk profiles.

Reduced Inequalities

We live in an age of information haves-and-have-nots. Climate shocks in the developed world hurt, but when they happen in least developed countries with limited resources and disaster relief systems, they can be a knock out blow. By providing useable weather information to poor farmers – along with large industry – we can even the playing field.

Knowing the weather should be a public good. Unfortunately, in many African nations, the poorest farmers have zero access to accurate forecasts. Instead they look to the skies to see their future. Hopefully, as part of this massive effort to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals they will be able to look to their cellphones instead, where they will receive an SMS alert saying that it’s time to plant sorghum, time to move to higher ground, time to bring their crops to market. 

Sustainable Cities and Communities  

Reliable weather information means vulnerable communities can optimize planting cycles. It means they can plan for long-term prosperity because they can protect roads and other productive infrastructure. It means they can address public health issues like malaria outbreaks that result from unusually heavy rains, allowing them to focus on more important things like better schools. It also means more opportunity and security in the countryside, which has the potential to slow the tide of urbanization and climate-change-induced migration across the continent.

Responsible Consumption and Production

With better information, comes better decision-making and long-term planning. Armed with accurate climate and weather information, African governments can create virtuous consumption and production cycles that adapt to changes in weather patterns. It also aids in strengthening value chains and fortifying virtuous cycles between consumer and vendor.

Climate Action

Action requires information. Only by informing the world’s decision makers with accurate models of long-term climatic risks can we make the right decisions to navigate these treacherous waters. We also need to be realistic in our approach to climate action. Mitigation alone will not be enough. African nations need to adapt their economies, their cultures, their societies, their way of doing things to a new global reality. With the right information, and the right support, they can achieve this, building resilient nations that can withstand the winds of change.

Life Below Water

Climate change is severely impacting coral reefs, fisheries, and the broader ocean ecosystem. With better information on storms, fisherman can properly plan and manage their fisheries, stay safe from storms and build prosperous futures that work in harmony with the ocean’s natural rhythms.

Life on Land

On land, this information can inform watershed management, biosphere protection zones and other mitigation efforts. It can also provide the framework to build conservation policies that protect our planet.

Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions

With our changing climate – and lack of adequately shared information - we are seeing a global increase in climate refugees and the specters of insecurity that manifest themselves in battles for scarce resources. By knowing what lies ahead, we can effectively plan for a new future. There is also the very real opportunity to fortify the structures of the African institutions that share weather information and the disaster management systems that keep her people safe.

Partnerships for the Goals

The weather knows no borders. It does not respect international treaties. By fostering the interchange of weather information across countries, we can limit the spread of disease, reduce knock-on affects from natural disasters and foster a culture of cooperation that shares valuable information for the global good.

In order to achieve financial sustainability of investments in the climate services sector, African leaders will need to engage a new group of private-sector actors working in this space – private weather vendors, industries such as mining, banking and insurance, and telecommunications firms that can help in the collection and distribution of early warnings. This type of engagement has the potential to amplify the impact of investments in new climate information and early warning systems across sub-Saharan Africa, while addressing pressing challenges facing National Meteorological and Hydrological Services – lack of capacity, limited staffing levels, budgets that prioritize other pressing humanitarian issues such as health and education, and outdated, hard-to-maintain and ineffective technology.

Links

Download a copy of this report.  

Bonizella Biagini is the Programme Manager of the UNDP Programme on Climate Information for Resilient Development in Africa. This multi-country programme supports Climate Information and Early-Warning Systems Projects in 11 of Africa’s Least Developed Countries in their missions to save lives and improve livelihoods. By building capacity to issue extreme weather warnings, sharing new technological advances in weather monitoring and forecasting, and facilitating innovative partnerships with the private sector, the programme works to foster regional cooperation, support strong institutions and build resiliency to climate change.