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Key social and economic drivers
1. Governments are striving to improve the well-being of
their citizens. Population growth, reducing poverty,
water security, food security, increasing prosperity,
and improving public health, safety and security are
key drivers. To deal with these issues, governments
have to develop and implement effective policy, and
promote fundamental tenets of societal and environ-
mental governance. However, as regards the
environment, it is common knowledge that we are
challenged by our natural environment, made worse
by changes in the climate, which threatens the
sustainable development of human societies through
extreme weather events causing disasters, reduced
food security, reduced availability of uncontaminated
freshwater, and the rise and spread of diseases. This
is further compounded by growing urbanization and
the expansion of human habitation into previously
unoccupied places, such as arid zones, mountain
slopes, flood plains and the sea’s edge. These are
exposing populations to air and waterborne diseases,
heat stress, drought, landslides, floods, storm surges
and tsunamis
2. The safety of life and protection of property is impor-
tant for all countries but especially for the sustainability
of emerging economies. These countries are highly
vulnerable to natural disasters, which can wipe out 10
to 15 per cent of a developing nation’s gross domestic
product. Only with a clear understanding of the poten-
tial threats, advanced warning, and adequate disaster
reduction and mitigation efforts can we properly
protect our societies
3. These are issues that must be dealt with if the global
community is to attain the targets set through the
2000 Millennium Declaration, which are also high-
lighted by the 2002 Johannesburg Plan of
Implementation of the World Summit on Sustainable
Development.
The role of National Meteorological and
Hydrological Services
4. As has been the case since the beginning of the modern
era of societal and environmental management, knowl
edge of weather and climate is key to all aspects of
human endeavours. It is within this framework that
National Meteorological and Hydrological Services
(NMHSs) in various countries have been well posi-
tioned to identify and deal with a wide range of
weather-, climate- and water-related issues that affect
human life and socio-economic development. For
example, with regard to natural hazards, NMHSs have
been tasked to sensitize the population to their
impacts, and to provide warnings of individual events,
to save lives, to sustain productivity, and to reduce
damage to property
5. NMHSs constitute the single authoritative voice on
weather warnings in their respective countries, and
in many they are also responsible for climate, air
quality, seismic and tsunami warnings. To reduce and
mitigate disasters requires well prepared NMHSs as
well as governments and populations to take appro-
priate action in response to warnings. NMHSs, within
the framework of the World Meteorological
Organization (WMO), are working to help govern-
ments improve decision-making to enable
populations to adapt to climate change, mitigate
natural hazards and sustain development. By helping
governments and the people to avert potential disas-
ters, NMHSs are a fundamental component of the
risk management infrastructure of countries in their
nation-building endeavours and, indeed, a contribu-
tor to sustainable development, particularly the
poverty alleviation effort. NMHSs are working
together to implement the WMO Multi-hazard
Prevention Strategy, which aims to reduce by 50 per
cent over the decade 2010-2019 the number of fatal-
ities caused by meteorological-, hydrological- and
EC S
TATEMENT ON THE ROLE AND OPERATION
OF
NMHS
FOR DECISION MAKERS
(EC-LVII, 2005)
Executive council statement on
the role and operation of national
meteorological and hydrolological
services for decision-makers