By Dele Ogbodo
The Director General/CEO of Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet), Prof. Charles Anosike, has rounded off a tripartite meeting with Vaisala of Finland representatives, and Mr. Patrick Benichou, Chairman of Meteo France International representatives.
The engagement was geared at exploring opportunities in weather and climate matters on improving forecast for sustainable development.
The meeting was held at the sideline of the ongoing 78th Session of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) Executive Council (EC), held in Geneva Switzerland, to execute a ‘Design, Build, Operate’ business model in addressing capacity gaps in weather and climate observation, forecasting and dissemination of Early Warning information that is human-centered in Nigeria.
Acknowledging the critical importance of Nigeria within the sub-region (especially West Africa) in meeting the increasing demand for impact-based, multi-hazard early warnings for climate mitigation and adaptation, the Finland and France CEOs have teamed up to design a suite of solutions for NiMet.
The prospect of the relationship is very high, drawing on the strengths/expertise of both companies in observation and forecasting solutions with years of experience across the globe including Africa (e.g. Angola, Ethiopia).
Targeted areas and sectors include aviation, agriculture, hydrometeorology, marine, disaster risk reduction, management etc.
Benefits of this potential opportunity include capacity and technology transfer, sustainable financing mechanism, post-installation supports, change management etc.
Speaking Anosike, emphasised the need to transcend technical monitoring and invest in building community capacity to respond and improve the socio-economic lives of Nigerians. “We must work towards achieving a human centered early warning system.” he said.
