Regional Consultation meeting on climate services in the North-Eurasian countries

The Regional Consultation meeting on climate services in the North-Eurasian countries was held in Sochi, Russian Federation on 19-20 October 2015. This regional consultation meeting aimed to integrate efforts of experts from NMHSs in the region with users of climate information from the priority areas of the GFCS for the purpose defining priorities for more effective production and use of global, region and national climate and forecasting information by all interested parties in climate-sensitive sectors in all North-Eurasian countries. It resulted in: (i) enhanced understanding of the needs for climate services in different user sectors; (ii) clear understanding of capacity development needs to implement the GFCS at regional and national levels; (iii) strategic guidance on institutional arrangements, partnerships and processes required to operationalize the GFCS at the regional and national level.

SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES OF THE CONSULTATION MEETING

• To review the current status of climate information in the North-Eurasian countries for addressing specific needs of climate services in priority socio-economic sectors (agriculture and food security, water resources, public health, energy and disaster risk reduction) at the national and regional levels;
• To consider mechanism of interaction between providers and users of climate services, to define key problems and advise efficient measure for interaction improvement;
• To formulate demands for capacity building in the North-Eurasian countries in terms of improvement of climate information products;
• To discuss and recommend advanced tools for national procedures of climate services on the basis of enhanced observation networks and prediction models;
• To enable better climate risk management and adaptation to climate variability and change, through incorporation of science-based information and prediction into decision making at all levels.