More financial support will be provided to 10 countries with significant weather and climate data gaps via the UN-backed Systematic Observations Financing Facility (SOFF), following a meeting of the fund’s steering committee on June 20-21.
SOFF is a UN specialized fund co-created by WMO, UNDP and UNEP to close the climate and weather observations data gap in countries with the most severe shortfalls in observations, prioritizing least developed countries (LDCs) and small island developing states (SIDS).
The decisions adopted by the steering committee respond to the ambition of the UN Secretary-General’s Early Warnings for All initiative and include:
- SOFF support for ten additional countries with significant weather and climate data gaps.
- 22 countries given the green light to start working on funding requests to close their basic data gaps.
- More than 60 countries to receive SOFF support in 2023, including all initial countries for fast-track implementation of the Early Warnings for All initiative.
- Important strategic decisions were taken, including on SOFF’s collaboration with the Green Climate Fund, Climate Investment Funds, Adaptation Fund, Global Environment Facility and the Climate Risk and Early Warning Systems initiative (CREWS).
- Belgium announced a €6.68m (US$7.2m) contribution to SOFF, becoming the 11th contributor to the SOFF UN fund that opened its doors for business in July 2022.
The selected countries represent areas of high priority to close the weather and climate data gaps for better weather forecasts and climate projections. These countries will receive technical and financial support to build human capacity and install the needed infrastructure to collect and share data, as well as to sustain operation and maintenance. Where infrastructure is already existing, SOFF will provide support to improve and rehabilitate.
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