The Weather Ready Nations Initiative

“Weather Ready Nation” has become the guiding set of principles for evolving the United States National Weather Service (NWS). A number of other countries are developing—or have developed—similar visions for the future, which emphasize ‘impact based decision support' and responsiveness to subsets of users.

The United States Government (NWS and USAID/Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance), in conjunction with WMO and other interested countries, have begun the establishment of “Weather Ready Nations”, an initiative to expand internationally the appropriate use of lessons learned thus far. Our current plan is to hold a workshop of interested parties early next year in order to draft a list of “Best Practices”. Then, we expect to have a second workshop, with an expanded list of countries, to review the list of “Best Practices” and to design three demonstration projects. These projects would explore application of selected practices in developing countries—examples might include use of “champions” (in the U.S., referred to as “ambassadors”), developing a weather ready plan or ‘roadmap', and application of social and economic benefits analysis to assist in better defining user community needs.