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ECE Phase
I
PEER-REVIEW MEETING
5-6 October 2000
Bangkok, Thailand
BACKGROUND NOTE
In the
wake of the 1997-1998 El Nino event,
the Asian Disaster Preparedness
Center (ADPC) and the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) took the
initiative to enhance the capacity
of key Southeast Asian nations to
deal with the ensuing crises. ADPC,
in collaboration with NOAA and with
support from OFDA, hosted the Asian
Regional Meeting on El Nino Related
Crises in Bangkok from 2 to 6
February 1998. The Meeting brought
together over 120 participants
including national policy and
decision makers, regional and
international climate scientists and
organizations, disaster managers
from countries of the region,
representatives from the
international humanitarian
assistance community including
bilateral and multilateral donors
and NGOs, and regional media
representatives.
The
Asian Regional Meeting on El Nino
Related Crises underlined the
severity of the 1997-98 El Nino
event and its impact, and noted the
following:
-
Understanding of the effects of
these events on society and the
environment in the region is
still limited.
-
Few integrated efforts have been
made to apply climate forecast
information to practical
problems of reducing the impact
of such extreme climate events.
-
The importance of interaction
between the scientists who
generate the climate forecasts
and the users of this
information has been recognized
for a long time, but few
concerted efforts have been made
in this direction.
-
Although in some countries of
the region efforts have been
made to understand and mitigate
the impact of extreme climate
events, the lessons learned have
seldom been documented and
shared with other countries of
the region.
-
Facilitating mechanisms are
required at the regional level
to share the lessons learned and
capitalize upon the experiences
of the past in dealing with the
disasters related to extreme
climate events.
-
A
need to develop a regional
capability to produce climate
information guidance that
matches the needs of the users
of this information.
As a
follow-on to the Asian Regional
Meeting on El Nino Related Crises in
February 1998, ADPC in collaboration
with NOAA and with support from
USAID/ OFDA has started a program on
understanding Extreme Climate Events
(ECE) and their impacts on society
and the environment in Southeast
Asia. The pilot program targets
Indonesia, the Philippines and
Vietnam and prepares ground for a
longer-term comprehensive regional
program toward the application of
climate forecasts for minimizing
negative consequences and
capitalizing potential benefits
associated with ECEs.
In
October 1998, the Start-up Technical
Strategy Session for the program was
held at ADPC, Bangkok. Participants
from the three target countries and
international experts deliberated
the issues and recommended an
implementation strategy of the
project. A copy of the report is
attached.
The
start-up technical session inter
alia recommended that the
understanding of issues relating to
application prospects of long-range
forecast information should have a
national focus. As a follow-on to
the recommendations of the technical
session, national scoping workshops
were organized in all the three
target countries. The participants
of the national scoping workshops
were drawn from physical climate
prediction agencies and climate
forecast information user
organizations.
The
national scoping workshops came up
with an implementation plan to
undertake the documentation of past
extreme climate events, their
effects on local weather variables
across different parts of the
country, and their impacts.
The
status of implementation of the
project in the three target
countries is given below:
INDONESIA
As
part of the project implementation
process, the Start-up Workshop was
held in 11-12 February 1999. As a
follow-up of the recommendations of
the Workshop, a quick assessment
study was undertaken on the status
of ENSO climate forecast application
in Indonesia. The assessment was
carried out by experts drawn from
the Directorate for Natural
Resources Inventory of the Agency
for the Assessment and Application
of Technology (TISDA-BPPT), the
Directorate of Crop Protection of
the Ministry of Agriculture, the
State Ministry of Public Works, and
the Bureau of Agricultural
Statistics (BPS). The National
Development Planning Agency (BAPPENAS),
in collaboration with the Asian
Development Bank, also made a
detailed analysis of the Causes,
Extent, Impact and Costs of 1997/98
Fires and Drought in Indonesia.
Based on these inputs, a report on
the status of climate forecast
application prospects in Indonesia
was prepared.
The
National Consultation Workshop will
be held on 11-12 October 2000 in
Jakarta under the overall
coordination of BPPT. The Workshop
will deliberate on the findings of
the research study with the
following objectives:
-
To
assess opportunities and
constraints for the translation
of global ENSO parameters into
local weather variables in
Indonesia.
-
To
present potential application of
ENSO forecast information to
manage future ENSO.
-
To
evolve an organizational
framework for institutionalizing
the climate forecast and
application system in Indonesia.
PHILIPPINES
In the
Philippines, the project is being
implemented under the leadership of
the National Disaster Coordinating
Council (NDCC) of the Department of
Defense. A National Scoping Workshop
was held on 31 January 2000. As a
follow-on of the recommendations of
the workshop, the documentation and
analysis of the impacts of extreme
climate events is being undertaken
by sectoral organizations. The
details are :
PAGASA - Physical
climate prediction
NDCC - Disaster events
Department of
Agriculture - Agriculture and
food security
National Water Resources Board -
Water resources
Department of Health - Public
health
Department of Environment
and - Forest fires and the
environment Natural Resources
The
documentation process is under
completion. A National Consultation
Workshop is planned in October 2000
to consider the research report and
chalk out future strategy for
institutionalizing climate forecast
and application system in the
Philippines.
VIETNAM
In
Vietnam, the project is being
implemented under the leadership of
the Disaster Management Centre of
the Ministry of Agriculture and
Rural Development. As a follow-up of
the recommendations of the National
Scoping Workshop, experts drawn from
the physical climate prediction
branch of the Hydro-Meteorological
Service, the Agrometeorological
Research Centre, the Irrigation
Department, and the Disaster
Management Centre of the Ministry of
Agriculture and Rural Development
undertook documentation and analysis
of the impacts relating to extreme
climate events.
The
quick assessment research report was
placed before a National
Consultation Workshop for chalking
out future strategy for
institutionalizing climate forecast
generation and application system.
The workshop recommended the
prospects of using ENSO forecast
information for managing the
following discernible ENSO impacts
in Vietnam:
-
Application prospects of
temperature variations for
managing winter-spring crop
production in North Vietnam.
-
The behavior of typhoon
incidences in terms of shifts in
time and space in Central
Vietnam could be used for
managing typhoon-related
disasters.
-
The behavior of rainfall and
stream flow parameters could be
used for evolving water resource
management practices and
contingency crop planning
particularly in Central Vietnam.
-
Destructive typhoon incidences
in Southern part of Vietnam
could be used for devising early
warning system for managing
typhoons.
The
National Consultation workshop
decided to establish a climate
forecast producer and user network
to ensure a continuous dialogue to
address the issues relating to
climate variability regardless of
the occurrence of extreme climate
events such as El Nino and La Nina.
As a
follow-on of these recommendations,
it has been decided that the
institutional mechanism will be put
in place to use a long-range
forecast information and share
experiences of using that
information regularly, immediately
after the receipt of wet season and
dry season forecasts. The first
workshop of climate forecast
producer and user institutions will
be held in November 2000. The
consultation process between climate
forecast producers and users will be
taken down to provincial level.
Given
this background, the peer-review
meeting is intended to:
1.
Review and validate the
methodologies adopted by the ECE
program for documentation and
analysis of the impacts of past
extreme climate events on different
sectors in Indonesia, the
Philippines and Vietnam.
The
participating countries, while
expressing their appreciation for
the project outcome, desired to
undertake pilot testing activities
to demonstrate the benefits of
utilizing long-range climate
forecast information for resource
management. Before undertaking pilot
testing activities, it is considered
necessary to share the findings of
the research efforts and to validate
the methodologies adopted for using
ENSO parameters for climate
prediction and resource management.
A methodology document that will
describe the rationale, the process
and outcomes will be discussed. The
participants are expected to
critically review the methodology
and give their recommendations for
its adoption and application.
2.
Identify specific follow-up pilot
activities in the three target
countries.
While
ENSO is one of the major
contributing factors of climate
variability, climate variability
itself is a continuous process.
Climate variability, even in
so-called normal times, impacts
society and the environment
significantly. The possible
mechanisms which impact climate
controls like monsoon systems,
cyclones and other linear systems
like easterly waves, etc. are linked
to sea surface temperature (eastern
equatorial Pacific) and Southern
Oscillation Index variations. Based
on the prediction of these
variables, it is possible to have
enough lead time to make use of a
long-range forecast information to
pre-assess the impacts and undertake
advance plans to manage climate
variability related impacts. Pilot
testing of long-range forecast
information in selected locations is
planned to deepen the understanding
of the impacts of climate
variability at the micro level and
assess the benefits of utilizing
forecast information for resource
management decisions.
3.
Review the lessons learned during
the implementation of the ECE
Program, and identify opportunities
for replication in the Asian region.
The
countries, which did not participate
in the pilot phase of the project,
are also subjected to climate
variability associated impacts. The
methodologies followed for utilizing
long-range forecast information for
managing climate variability during
the pilot phase could be replicated
in other countries also. Since the
climate of most countries of
Southeast Asia and South Asia are
controlled by the tropical monsoon
system, there are potential
opportunities to replicate the
methodology to cover countries like
Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Myanmar
(Indochina monsoon system) and
India, Bangladesh and part of Sri
Lanka (Indian monsoon system).
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