Other key recommendations of the meeting include the commercialization of weather and climate services in the NMHSs. Decision makers were urged to support NMHSs to enhance service delivery in mitigating severe impacts associated with weather and climate extremes and ensure that NMHSs are the “single authoritative source” of warnings, and official source of weather, climate and hydrological information services.

The Management Group made recommendations and proposed initiatives to be implemented by 2019.  These include the establishment of regional frameworks for climate services and National Framework for Climate Services (NFCS) in Africa, and the implementation of the WMO Integrated Global Observing Systems / WMO Information Systems (WIGOS / WIS) Programmes.  The Group also highlighted the importance of the Severe Weather Forecasting Demonstration Project (SWFDP), which is expected to be scaled-up in all sub-regions, as well as the establishment of the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP).  Finally the Management Group further reiterated the importance of the African Ministerial Conference on Meteorology (AMCOMET) as a platform to be capitalized to ensure the increased visibility of National Meteorological and Hydrological Services and as mechanism for their national governments for increased support in the enhancement of NMHS capacity.

The discussions included WMO’s plans to support developing nations in Africa to enhance their ability to provide and disseminate weather and climate services, notably to support human capacity development and enhancing the observation network in Kenya. They also discussed the potential transformation of the Kenya Meteorological Department (KMD) into an agency in order to better serve its stakeholders. The Secretary General expressed his satisfaction with services KMD, particularly with regard to the support that it provides to other NMHSs in the region.

Participants included representatives from Cabo Verde, Kenya, Mauritius, Morocco, Seychelles and South Africa, the African Union Commission, ACMAD, AU Space Working Group, EUMETSAT, Group on Earth Observations, among others.  Key outcomes and recommendations from the meeting include the development of a Pilot Project as input to the African Space Implementation Plan.  Components of the Pilot Project would include identification of existing assets and gaps on the ground (infrastructure) and application segments, proposal on how to strengthen regional cooperation in the Application Segment, the step-by-step design elements to provide a cost-effective programme, avoid duplication and maximize complementarity with other components of the Global Observing System.  The pilot project is also expected to take into consideration the long-standing partnership between Africa and Europe and their common interest in key environmental observations are major factors to be taken into account.  These activities are critical meteorological inputs to the Implementation Plan of the African Regional Space Programme currently being developed by the AU Space Working Group.