Improving Availability, Access and Use of Climate Information in Ethiopia

1. Improving Availability, Access and Use of Climate Information in Ethiopia Tufa Dinku1, Kinfe Hilemariam2, David Grimes3, and Stephen Connor1 1. International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI) The Earth Institute at Columbia University, USA tufa@iri.columbia.edu 2. National Meteorology Agency, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia  3. Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, UK

2. Outline • The Problem • Suggested solution • Implementation in Ethiopia • Scaling up

3. The Problem • Number of weather stations not adequate, and deteriorating • Most stations located in the cities along main roads •  Limited data over most of rural Africa • Serious gaps in observations (missing data) • Quality of available data not very good • Limited access and use of the available data

4. Proposed Solution Improving availability: Quality control and combine local observations with global products such as satellite proxies and model reanalysis data  Global products help in filling spatial and temporal gaps • Improving access and use: • Provide online-access to data, analysis tools, and products • Develop products for specific applications • Train users to understand, demand, and use climate data • Facilitate the formation of community of practice

5. Improving availability: The concept Station data Global product Combined Product

6. Main Components • Training of NMA staff • Organizing and QC station data • Obtaining and processing raw METEOSAT data • Calibrating satellite rainfall algorithm • Generating climate time series • Improving NMA’s Web Page • Creating Climate Analysis and Applications Map Rooms • Training the user community to understand, demand, and use climate information

7. Products (ten-daily @ 10km spatial resolution) • Gridded station data: 1981-2010 • Satellite Rainfall Estimates: 1983-2010 • Combined Rainfall Product: 1983-2010 • Combined Temperature Products: 1981-2010

8. Improving Access and Use Improved NMA Wep page for better Access to information products Targeted Map Rooms for Improved use

11. In Summary: Some key points • The project is a success only because of NMA’s open mindedness • Trained NMA staff did most of the work  insures sustainability • Obtaining and processing raw satellite data was critical • Local calibration of satellite rainfall algorithm VERY important • Combining the different data sets helps to fill spatial and temporal gaps • Improving data access and use also VERY important. • The Map Rooms are built using IRI Data Library tools, which were then transferred to NMA: good example of technology transfer • NMA is less reluctant to shares the combined data

12. Scaling up /Replicating elsewhere The three major components of the project 1. Organization and QC of station data: Challenging 2. Obtaining and processing raw satellite data: Daunting 3. Developing methodology and codes: Time consuming DONE  Next country/region cheaper and faster

13. Thank You

15. Evaluation of Products Comparing the satellite rainfall estimate with other products ETHTAM Comparison of the current satellite rainfall estimate with other widely used satellite products at spatial resolution of 0.25o and dekadal aggregation.

16. Evaluation of Products Comparison of the different rainfall products with gridded raingauge data for the MAM season. Both the reference gridded gauge and the four products have been averaged over 0.25o lat/long boxes