The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is to create a global framework for giving developing countries access to climate data and help them prepare to the expected impacts of climate change.

Delegates representing 189 nations endorsed the $75 million-a-year initiative on Friday, concluding a congress in Geneva, Switzerland, of the WMO’s governing body, which meets every four years.

The ‘Global Framework for Climate Services’ will provide on-demand information such as regional weather and climate predictions to policy-makers, businesses and individual farmers and fishermen in particularly vulnerable parts of the world.

Currently around 70 developing countries have little or no access to climate data. Some of the poorest and most vulnerable nations don’t have any operational tools for weather observation and prediction. In the east African state of Djibouti, for example, the lack of rain gauges and weather radar makes flood predictions virtually impossible.

Likewise, many communities in Africa and elsewhere lack access to information and services that they would need to ‘climate-proof’ local water management, agriculture and health protection systems.

Supplying information with which developing countries can start to set up more effective climate adaptation strategies will be one of the WMO’s top priorities in the next four years, delegates agreed. The implementation of the framework will be reviewed next year.

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.