Saving lives, improving livelihoods and increasing resiliency with tailored weather information services.

1. The Last Mile:
Saving lives, improving livelihoods and increasing
resiliency with tailored weather information services
Dr. Bonizella Biagini
CIRDA Manager
15 March 2016
Livingstone, Zambia

2. Support focused on
• Data and tech transfer
• Identify and reach end users
• Mainstream/integrate data into
development planning (NAPs)
• Financial sustainability planning
Provides support to 11 countries.
Objectives
• Support climate services in their
efforts to collect, analyse and
disseminate climate information for
long term planning and adaptation
• Meet the need to generate timely,
high quality climate information that
is comprehensible and applicable to
end users
• Enable communities and policy
makers to access climate information
CIRDA Overview
Benin
Burkina
Faso
Ethiopia
The Gambia
Liberia
Malawi
SãoTomé
andPríncipe
Tanzania
Uganda
Zambia
Sierra Leone
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3. 3
Progress on Global Support
Technical
Assistance to
National
Teams
•On the ground support on hydrology, technology, meteorology and forecasting
•Data rescue and digitization support
•Workshops on forecasting and technologies (creating tools)
•Procurement support to at least 7 partners
•Establishment of Long Term Agreements (LTAs) to enable acquisition of CI technologies and services
Private Sector
Engagement
•Market study to identify partnerships and potential for revenue streams
•Workshops on private sector engagement (Uganda) and application development (Zambia)
•Outreach to mobile phone companies, technology providers, financial sector and other PS potential
partners
Knowledge
Management
and best
practices
sharing
•Facilitating dialogue among government and non governmental stakeholders
•Communication toolkit for national projects
•Communication platform to share achievements, best practices and lessons learned
•Creating new tools to communicate climate and weather information to a broad audience
•South South Cooperation to identify best practices- missions and advice on training opportunities

4. 4
Project Progress Indicators
Capacity Improvement (% achieved of targeted improvement) Technology Transfer (Equipment Procured)
Direct CIRDA Support (# of
field missions)
Benin 29%
7 automatic agro-climatic stations
3 automatic synoptic stations
140 limnimetric staff-gauges
20 automatic limnimetric recorders
1 sea buoy, 2 ADCPs
2 multi-parameters and portable analyzers of sea water
19 hydrological stations were rehabilitated
2
Burkina Faso 10% planning procurement of 150 AWS and automatic rain gauges 1
The Gambia Preparatory phase
Plan to use LTA
9 AWS (WMO-compliant)
2
Ethiopia
progress was registered - technical trainings and awareness-
creation events
40 AWS
1 upper air radio sonde
1
Liberia Preparatory phase
LTA
11 lightning sensors
11 real time all-in-one AWS (the full service - includes renewal of services for up
to 5 years)
1
Malawi
progress was registered - NMHS staff attending university
programmes, technical trainings and awareness-creation events
Plan to use LTA
10 AWS
3
Sao Tome and
Principe
progress was registered - technical trainings, project
management and journalists' trainings
- the international tender process was finalized
- technical requirements were sent to CIRDA for the development of
specifications
0
Planned Q2
Sierra Leone Preparatory phase
LTA
- signed contract with the Procurement Support Unit to outsource procurement
- 8 lightning sensors with 8 surface observation stations and 2 synoptic stations
(mix between WMO-compliant and innovative technologies)
2
Tanzania
progress was registered - technical trainings, awareness-creation
events
16 AWS
10 hydro stations
50 river gauges
20 automatic rainfall gauges
3
Uganda 20%
LTA
20 AWS
a lighting detection network
5 sensors with 5 real time all-in-one AWS
4
Zambia 27% 26 AWS 3
Domestic NMHS financing – Zambia (increased 50%), Uganda (increased by more than 100% - radar acquisition), Benin (increased 10%)

5. General Challenges
5
Building
Capacity
Growing need for
capacity building and
specialized training
Need for procurement
support and other
services, including
communication
Partnerships
Lack of institutional
coordination and
information exchange,
including resources
management
Identifying
complementary roles
of governments,
private sector and civil
society
Absence of regional
cooperation even
among neighboring
countries
Technology
and Services
Going beyond
hardware and
observations to
forecasts and
applications
Understanding and
accessing innovative
technologies and
services, know how
and software
Limited tools available
in countries to
package and
communicate
information sectorally
for access to end users

6. Current Challenges
Status of implementation:
 Some countries are still in the process of acquiring technology that forms
the basis for climate information and early warnings
 Most countries that have acquired the technology have not yet
transformed the basic observations from their systems into useful and
actionable information
Next steps: weather and climate observations to be included into:
 Weather and climate forecasts
 Fundamental input to the NAPs
 Public “Last Mile” products and services (early warnings), and
 Private “Last Mile” products and services (sustainability applications)
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7. 7
Goals of this Workshop
1. Now we increasingly have the data collection.
2. How can we transform data to information, and communicate the last
mile to help vulnerable communities?
This is how:
• Explore pathways to make the data available to end users through local
networks, technology, and partnerships, including identification of end
users’ needs
• Consider market opportunities in the form of new weather products and
services with the benefit of a Market Study in the 11 partner countries
• Explore relationships and partnerships with private weather services,
NGOs, and others that can help national climate services reach the Last
Mile – and become more sustainable
• With technical support, work on country strategies for the next phase of
the CIRDA program to reach end users and get to last mile
• Engage with software developers here in a “hackathon” to design and
develop new applications to transform and communicate weather data to
end users

8. Thank you
Dr. Bonizella Biagini
CIRDA Manager
UNDP-GEF
bonizella.biagini@undp.org
www.undp-alm/porjects/cirda
www.undp-cirda.blogspot.com
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