About 3% of Asia?s land area is classified as low elevation coastal zone, yet it is home to 13% of the region?s population. Of the top 10 countries in the world with largest population counts in low elevation coastal zones, 8 are in Asia and, among them, Bangladesh, China and Vietnam are the most vulnerable countries exposed to multiple coastal hazards. Early warning is a key element of disaster risk reduction in all the time scales. National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NHMSs) are mandated to observe, understand, and predict the weather and climate of the country, and provide meteorological, hydrological, and related services to contribute to the safety and to the socio-economic benefit and welfare of their communities through reduction of the impact of natural hazards, and safety of life and property. The project aims to strengthen institutional systems for end-to-end early warning of hydro-meteorological hazards, which occur in short, medium, long term and climate timescale in Bangladesh, China, and Vietnam

?a) Establishing multi-stakeholder forums for early warning through which the NHMS could, deliver early warning information to relevant sectors, evaluate potential impacts and accordingly prepare response plans & sector specific adaptation measures, get feedbacks from the users on relevance of information on decisions to reduce disaster risks, and could improve the early warning system with the user feedbacks b) Developing user-relevant early warning tools and early warnings for short range weather (such as cyclones, storm surges, heavy rainfall events, severe thunderstorms, floods, etc.), medium range weather (such as dry & wet spells, etc.) and long range or seasonal weather (such as excess & deficit rainfall, prolong droughts, etc.) and climate projection (to downscale future climate projections for indicating probable temperature & rainfall trends, extreme weather events, etc.) for reducing disaster risks c) Enhancing institutional capacities for the application of early warnings, seasonal climate outlooks and future climate projection information products in decision-making

(i) Terms of reference of the multi-stakeholder national forum (ii) Summary reports of multi-stakeholder national forums, to include: warning information delivered (short term - cyclones, storm surges, floods, etc., medium term - wet & dry spells, etc., long term or seasonal scale - excess & deficit rainfall, prolong droughts, etc. and future climate projections), plan of action in response to the warning information, user feedback, and forum recommendations and actions taken for improving system performance iii) Training and capacity building opportunities for climatologists attached to ADPC and National Hydrological and Meteorological Services of three partner countries. iv) Technical assistance by BCCR in developing user-relevant early warning tools and early warning information products for short, medium, long term and climate timescales (v) Successful implementation of user-relevant early warning tools in NHMS (vi) Demonstration of sites, districts and provinces selected for issuing warning, seasonal outlooks and future projections (vii) User need assessment report (to include methodology and assessment results) (viii) Report on assessment of most appropriate risk information product (to include methodology, assessment results, and recommendations for use in the country) (ix) Technical report on the generation of location-specific / district / province disaster risk information to include methodology and results from: downscaling of atmospheric filed variables from the GCMs using state-of-the-art numerical models, storm surge models, hydrological models, etc. (x) Report on Decision Support System (DSS) tool development to include methodology, description and sample of tools developed (xi) Report on training of decision-makers in vulnerable sectors at national and sub-national levels on translation of disaster risk information into impact outlooks and response options (to include training agenda, manual, participants list, and evaluation). (xii) End of event / season reports detailing: information received, impact outlook and response plan by each sector, actions taken by community and households in each project site, mid-season corrections undertaken by sectoral agencies, feedback from households, communities, sectoral agencies on relevance of warning information received, good practice and lessons learned during the event / season. (xiii) Summary report of regional sharing and learning workshop, to include experiences shared, good practices and lessons identified, recommendations, agenda, and participants list (xiv) Publication on project outcomes, lessons, and successes

View 7.CCCRM Project 232 (Capacity Building of National Focal Points for Developing and Dissemination of Early Warnings for short, medium and long term Hydro-Meteorological hazards and future climate projections in Bangladesh, China and Vietnam (Theme 1)) in a larger map