Sub-seasonal forecasting in Africa: training, tools development and support (S2S-FAcTS)

The project is part of the Weather and Climate Information Services (WISER) Programme funded by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, and administered by the Met Office. The WISER program strives to bolster global resilience to the impacts of climate change by transforming the development and use of co-produced weather and climate services, which support decision-making at local, national, and regional levels. SEI’s role in the S2S-FAcTS project is to enhance weather and climate information services in sub-Saharan Africa, through three work packages:

• Development of the Climate Predictability Tool (CPT+) for new sub-seasonal products: CPT+ is being developed to facilitate production of sub-seasonal forecasts by national meteorological and hydrological services (NMHS) and regional climate centres (RCCs) customized for forecast users in agriculture, water, health, disasters, energy and more. Version 19 of CPT+ has been developed through WISER funding and is available at cptplus.org.
• Facilitation and improved resilience of access to model inputs: For their operational seasonal and sub-seasonal forecasting, many NMHSs relied on important datasets that were accessible through Columbia University’s IRI Data Library. The S2S-FaCTS project has been seeking ways to ensure ongoing access to these datasets once the IRI Data Library is shut down. It has also been developing CPT+ in ways to help secure its longer-term sustainability.
• Facilitation of a community of service for NMHSs on seasonal to sub-seasonal production and design: In addition to developing a new home and website for CPT, SEI is supporting RCCs and NMHSs in sub-Saharan Africa through engagement in workshop and training events. SEI will develop a series of training videos on how to generate customized sub-seasonal forecasts using CPT+.