12 Feb 2015 | News

ICIMOD participates in the SAARC Working Group on Monsoon Meeting

As part of the SAARC monsoon initiative, the second meeting of the SAARC working group on monsoon (SWGM) was held in Pune, India from 8-9 December. ICIMOD is a member of the SWGM and has been contributing to its meetings since its inception. The SAARC monsoon initiative seeks to enhance the capacity of the SAARC member states to predict and assess the vulnerability related to the monsoon system as well as climate change and to take proper adaptation and mitigation measures through regular and sustained interaction among the member states, and early warning systems at the national and regional levels.

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At the second SWGM meeting, which was jointly organized by SAARC Meteorological Research Centre (SMRC) and the India Meteorological Department, Dr Mandira Singh Shrestha, senior water resources specialist at ICIMOD, provided an overview of extreme events in the HKH region in 2014. B. Mukhopadhayay, ADGM (research) from IMD Pune, stressed the importance of enhancing the capacity for forecasting. Dr S.K. Roy Bhowmik, Head of the Theoretical Division at SMRC, Dhaka, provided an overview of the SAARC monsoon initiative programme.

The meeting reflected on the extreme events in 2014 in South Asia and the lessons learnt from these events in terms of what could be improved to strengthen weather and climate forecasting systems at the regional and national levels. Participants discussed the new developments and the experiences from national and regional projects in weather and climate. The country presentations shed light on the hydrometeorological capacity of the agencies and the networks for providing weather and flood forecasts. The meeting provided an opportunity to share best practices and new methods in weather forecasting, as well as to promote cooperation and collaboration among the SAARC member countries and other stakeholders.