Adding Value in the Early Warnings Value Chain
The Value Chain Approaches to Describe, Improve, Value and Co-Design Early Warning Systems
The Value Chain Approaches to Describe, Improve, Value and Co-Design Early Warning Systems, recently published by WMO, provides a framework to analyse and optimize early warning systems, promoting a holistic view, driven by users’ needs for information to respond to hazards. In addition to including weather and hazard knowledge and technology used in modelling, the publication considers the communication and decision-support aspects of warnings based on partnerships between experts and local communities.
In addition, the publication provides a guiding framework for various agencies and authorities, including emergency managers, forecasting agencies and government inquiry teams. It will aid in structuring evidence impacts of weather-related hazards along the early warning value chain and in identifying areas for targeted investment. Additionally, the value chain analysis approaches provided in the publication supports a wide range of applications and managerial decisions for organizations involved in early warning systems, guiding them on how to co-develop new early warning systems that align with the goals of the United Nations Early Warnings for All initiative.
This new publication was produced under the High Impact Weather project of the World Weather Research Programme (WWRP) and jointly compiled with the Societal and Economic Research Applications (SERA) Working Group. The High Impact Weather project brought together meteorologists and practitioners, such as weather forecasting agencies, to examine Value Chain Approaches to Evaluate the End-to-End Warning Chain to gain an understanding of the shortcomings of weather forecasts and warnings, which derive from sophisticated observational and computational tools, and where they can be improved. The High Impact Weather project is an example of the integrative and interdisciplinary science that is today essential to address the complexity of effective warnings.
