The eighteenth session of the World Meteorological Congress is taking place from 3 to 14 June 2019. The WMO Member States and Territories will elect the Vice-Presidents of WMO (who are Ex-Officio Members of the Executive Council). In this context, the WMO Regional Office for Europe interviewed Celeste Saulo, the Director of SMN.
Regional Office for Europe (ROE): Dr Celeste Saulo, what is in your view the most important matter WMO should focus on in the next several years?
“We can all identify as a key driver of WMO activities the increased social demand for effective, timely and relevant meteorological, climate and environmental services.
To accomplish this demand we have to continue building on WMO strengths, based on cooperation, sharing data, knowledge and infrastructure to increase our capacity for service delivery.
One challenge to WMO is building the proper partnerships at global and regional levels while supporting the Members at national levels to strengthen the National Hydrological and Meteorological Services and their capacity to achieve the objectives defined in the Paris Agreement, the Sendai Framework and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Special attention has to be placed in the most vulnerable countries and populations, whose needs may require additional efforts if we want to succeed in our view of a more equitable world.
Underpinning these actions, I envision WMO as a key actor to attract the research and academic communities, to engage with them in the ‘science for better services’ concept.”
ROE: Thank you!
