Climate Exchange

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ommunities

to initiate a regional operational seasonal forecast by

collecting downscaled forecasts to the local stations.

This reflects the strong potential of existing regional

organizations to strengthen the value chain of

climate information. Such trainings and workshops

also provide the opportunity to get feedback from

users for further improvement of CLIK, which is kept

under continuous revision.

APCC interacts with users and publicizes its prod-

ucts and services through various international

outreach activities. Since its inception, APCC has

organized the annual APEC Climate Symposium

(APCS). The APCS is a venue for stakeholders and

scientists from around the Asia-Pacific region to gather

together and exchange information and best practices.

In this forum, interactions take place between infor-

mation providers (climate scientists or dynamical

seasonal forecast providers) and between providers

and customers (NHMSs from developing countries and

experts from different sectors). In the early years of the

APCS, the dialogue revolved primarily around infor-

mation exchange among climate scientists. However,

as the importance of user interaction has become

more widely recognized, the focus of the APCS has

shifted towards the practical application of climate

Seasonal forecast information is formally disseminated through

the APCC webpage and a basic climate outlook is distributed by

email. In addition to the formal dissemination of its seasonal predic-

tion products, APCC has developed a web-based tool, the Climate

Information Tool Kit (CLIK).

CLIK is an online interface with

some user functionality which allows users to access and customize

the APCC MME seasonal forecast. It also provides the capability to

statistically downscale the seasonal forecast to the region of interest.

As an online tool, CLIK does not require any additional program

installations or data except for a basic web browser, unless the user

chooses to downscale the seasonal forecast with respect to their own

station data. Since its launch in 2009, usage and recognition of the

tool have continually increased.

The goal of CLIK is to enhance the accessibility of seasonal

forecast information with low requirements in terms of prior

knowledge or tools. APCC has hosted several series of training

and workshops on CLIK for a variety of users (representatives

from NHMSs, as well as experts from sectors such as hydrol-

ogy, agriculture and environmental sciences) and the importance

of tools that lower barriers to the access and use of climate

information has been clearly recognized. The participants and

stakeholders have been overwhelmingly appreciative about the

ease of use and the fact that CLIK requires little advance train-

ing or tools. After a workshop with the Association of Southeast

Asian Nations, the enthusiasm over CLIK resulted in a proposal

Multinational contributors to APCC MME seasonal forecasts

Source: APCC