China makes indelible contribution to global meteorological capacity-building

As the only developing country home to a world meteorological center, China plays an active role in information sharing, weather forecasting, disaster early warning, and promoting the international application of meteorological satellites, making due contributions to global meteorological capacity-building.

A Long March-4C rocket carrying the Fengyun-3E (FY-3E) satellite blasts off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China, July 5, 2021. (Photo/ Wang Jiangbo)

When a powerful cyclone named Amphan gathered strength on May 17 2020, the Bangladesh meteorological department contacted the World Meteorological Center Beijing (WMC-BJ) in an urgent demand for real-time access to higher-resolution Chinese meteorological satellite monitoring and numerical forecast guidance products.

Upon receipt of the request, WMC-BJ immediately organized experts to provide special services and set up a special user account for the Bangladesh meteorological department on the center's highly interactive website to provide Bangladeshis with the products they needed in real time.

"The main responsibility of the WMC-BJ is to provide guidance products such as weather, climate, water and environmental statistics, and support the enhancement of operational capacity of weather forecasting in less developed countries," introduced Zhou Qingliang, head of the WMC-BJ operations office.

"Dealing with extreme weather and climate change requires cooperation among all parties, so the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), a specialized agency of the United Nations, has set up a cooperation mechanism of world meteorological centers under its framework. Competent WMO members provide more products, such as global meteorological monitoring, forecasting and services, and China has assumed this obligation since 2017," Zhou explained.

"Every day, we need to provide global weather forecasts for the next 10 days, and release monitoring information on El Nino and La Nina phenomena, as well as monthly, seasonal and annual climate forecasts," Zhou added.

In addition to these obligations, WMC-BJ also regards it as an important duty to help developing countries ramp up their meteorological capacity-building, and earnestly provides technical support and personnel training to countries and regions along the Belt and Road.

"As a large meteorological country, China has accumulated many practical experiences in dealing with various meteorological disasters in the past, and we hope to share them with less developed countries in Africa and Asia so as to improve their capacity for disaster prevention and mitigation." Zhou noted.

It was reported that prior to the outbreak of COVID-19, China Meteorological Administration held about 15 international training courses annually to provide short-term special training for about 300 meteorological experts from developing countries. The content of these courses covers the application of Fengyun meteorological satellites, typhoon forecasting, climate prediction, meteorological disaster prevention and reduction, among others.