KEYNOTE ADDRESS AT THE UNITED STATES CLIMATE CHANGE SCIENCE PROGRAM:
PLANNING WORKSHOP FOR SCIENTISTS AND STAKEHOLDERS

by

Professor G.O. P. Obasi

Secretary-General

World Meteorological Organization

(Washington, D.C., 3 December 2002)

Dr Samuel W. Bodman, Deputy Secretary of Commerce,

Dr John Marburger, Science Adviser to the President and Director of the
Office of Science and Technology Policy,

Vice-Admiral Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Under Secretary of Commerce for
Oceans and Atmosphere and Administrator of the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration,

The Honourable David Garman, Assistant Secretary of Energy,

The Honourable Sean O'Keefe, Administrator of National Aeronautical and
Space Administration,

Dr James R. Mahoney, Assistant Secretary of Commerce,

Agency Leaders from the United States and International Organizations,

Distinguished Guests,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It gives me great pleasure to present this keynote address to this
important audience. On behalf of the World Meteorological Organization
(WMO), and my own, I wish to congratulate the organizers for putting
together this very impressive United States Climate Change Science
Program: Planning Workshop for Scientists and Stakeholders. I am
thankful for the kind invitation of the United States Secretary of
Commerce Honourable Donald L. Evans communicated to me by Dr James R.
Mahoney, the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere.
Given that scientists in this country always occupy a frontline position
in global research arena, the importance of this workshop is certainly
not limited to its potential impact on climate-related policy of the
United States of America. Indeed, its impact will permeate to the
international community at large. The presence of scientists and climate
stakeholders from several organizations and countries is testimony to
the wide interest in the outcome of this Workshop. I therefore commend
the organizers for this timely response to President George W. Bush's
direction that the U.S. global change and climate change science
programmes must be objective, sensitive to uncertainties, and well
documented for public debate.

Today, the world community is concerned about potential climate change
as a growing number of events such as an unabated increase in greenhouse
gases, a succession of record temperatures and an increasing number of
extreme weather and climate events, all appear to be characteristic of a
warmer climate. We therefore welcome the opportunity, as an
international partner, to offer some comments as possible inputs to the
draft version of the Strategic Plan for Climate Change and Global Change
Studies of the US Climate Change Science Program. Given the
comprehensive nature of this workshop agenda and the objective of the
Plan which will place emphasis on the development of short-term products
to support climate change policy and resource management
decision-making, it is my expectation that the workshop outcome will
have a significant bearing not only on the future strategic direction of
the United States climate community but also on that of the global
community including the related programmes of international
organizations.

Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

Scientific assessments have shown that, over the past several decades,
pollution from human activities, especially the burning and use of
fossil fuels, is changing the natural composition of the atmosphere. For
over 160 000 years up to about 1800AD, the atmospheric concentration of
carbon dioxide (CO2), a principal greenhouse gas (GHG), varied only by 1
to 3 per cent. Since then, it has increased by over 32 per cent, and
reached 370 parts per million by volume (ppmv) at the end of 2001. It is
estimated that today's level of CO2 concentration has not been exceeded
during the past 420 000 years. More than half of the CO2 increase has
occurred since 1950 and is reckoned to be proportional to energy use.

Associated with the growing GHGs in the atmosphere is the increasing
globally averaged surface temperatures, collected through WMO's Global
Observing System. According to records maintained by Members of WMO, the
warmest year since instrumental record began in 1860s, occurred in 1998,
with 2001 as the second warmest. So far, nine of the warmest years have
occurred since the beginning of 1990. These conditions are part of a
continuing trend to warmer global temperatures that have resulted in a
rise of more than 0.6°C during the past 100 years, albeit that rise in
temperature has not been continuous. Since 1976, the global average
temperature has risen at a rate approximately three times faster than
the century-scale trend. In addition, the global average sea level has
risen by 10 to 20 cm during the 20th century. Based on new and stronger
evidence, the Third Assessment Report of the WMO/UNEP Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released in 2001 concluded that "most of
the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human
activities". This conclusion must not be taken lightly.

Additionally, in recent decades, a growing number of unprecedented
weather extremes such as tropical cyclones, severe floods and droughts
continue to cause considerable loss of life and inflict damages to
property. In recent months, major storm events and floods affected many
countries across Europe, including Austria, the Czech Republic, France
and Germany, in Asian countries such as Bangladesh, China, India and
Nepal, in African countries such as Niger, Mali and part of Guinea, and
recently in South America including Southern Argentina and Chile.
Record-breaking droughts have had adverse consequences in a number of
Middle East countries, Brazil, the Horn of Africa and the area from
Central Asia to Northern China. Southern Africa and the Horn of Africa
are currently in the throes of severe drought affecting the livelihood
of about 23 million people.

Presently, a number of uncertainties and gaps in our knowledge do not
allow us to relate, with certainty, these events to climate change. On
the other hand, the existence of these uncertainties does not also imply
that there is total lack of knowledge on the subject. For example, we
are certain of the continued increases of greenhouse gases in the
atmosphere. We also know that such increases will lead to a change in
the radiative properties of the atmosphere-ocean-land-ice system. These
will be accompanied by adjustments that will add to or subtract from the
warming. The main difficulty we face is the inability to forecast with
the desired degree of accuracy the magnitude, the rate, the time and
space distribution and the consequences of human-induced climate change.
This is one important reason why this workshop is relevant to both the
national and the international communities. It is also a reason why we
should seek to improve our scientific knowledge of climate variability
and change whilst at the same time striving to ensure that the
environmental and socio-economic conditions of present and future
generations are not put at serious risk.

Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

While recognising that a great deal still needs to be done in terms of
systematic observations, scientific research and policy development,
implementation, and strengthened international collaboration in these
areas, we should nevertheless acknowledge that much has already been
achieved on the assessment of the impacts of climate variability and
potential climate change on human systems. In this regard, I wish to
take this opportunity to pay tribute to the most valuable work carried
out by the WMO/UNEP Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
since its establishment in 1988. Its timely, comprehensive and
authoritative work has assisted the world community in proposing a
number of actions that would protect the global climate especially in
the context of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol.

A major recommendation in the IPCC Third Assessment Report is the need
for additional systematic and sustained climate observations. This is
coupled with the serious concern over the decline of some existing
global observing networks. The improvement of the global observing
system for climate change assessment remains crucial for the future, an
issue that is highlighted in the agenda of this workshop. In this
context, WMO will continue to mobilize all possible efforts, in
partnership with concerned parties, in strengthening its networks,
including those of the World Weather Watch (WWW) for weather and climate
data, its Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) for the monitoring of the
chemical composition of the atmosphere, especially greenhouse gases, and
its hydrological observing stations. WMO\'s policy ensures that these
data are exchanged freely and without restriction for research and
educational purposes. WMO also coordinates a network of global data
centres for various parameters including meteorological elements,
greenhouse gases, and ozone and run off data. These unique data sets are
vital for climate change prediction and assessment, the proposed
Integrated Global Observing Strategy (IGOS) and for the Global Climate
Observing System (GCOS), which is seeking to enhance the climate
observing system in the oceanic and terrestrial domains as well.

In relation to oceanic observations, it is planned to deploy by 2005, in
the context of the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS), 3000 Array for
Real-time Geostrophic Oceanography (Argo) profiling floats to observe
the oceans in real time. Along with meteorological, environmental and
research and development satellites, the Argo floats will contribute to
research efforts on the seasonal to inter-annual climate variability and
to significant improvements in climate prediction.

Permafrost observation is another important element in the mission of
GCOS because variations of permafrost temperature can be a substantive
indicator of climate change and climate variability. For this purpose,
the GCOS Terrestrial Network for Permafrost comprises some 90 stations
and was established in 1999 to monitor changes of the frozen ground
temperature and seasonal thaw. Recently, the GCOS Terrestrial Network
for Glaciers was established for monitoring the mass balance some 60
glaciers and the length of some 800 glaciers throughout the world.
Furthermore, to meet with the terrestrial requirement for climate, GCOS
will continue to be closely coordinated with Global Terrestrial
Observing System (GTOS) which, among others, will ensure the improvement
of data coverage on global change in terrestrial ecosystems.

In order to ascertain the adequacy of these diverse global climate
observing systems, the GCOS in 1998, made major recommendations on the
means to improve systematic observation to meet the needs of the UNFCCC.
Subsequently, the UNFCCC invited the Conference of the Parties to
prepare national reports on systematic observation and to take into
account the capacity building needs of developing countries. The United
States prepared an exceptionally comprehensive report on its climate
activities. A second report on the adequacy of global climate observing
systems that will determine the progress achieved and assess how well
the current and planned systems will meet the needs of the Convention
will be considered next year by the Conference of Parties of the UNFCCC.
The GCOS Secretariat is also leading the development of Regional Action
Plans that identify regional needs and priorities for addressing these
needs.

As regards climate research, which is central to many of the agenda
items of the workshop, the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP),
jointly sponsored by WMO, the International Council for Science (ICSU)
and the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO),
continues to be in the forefront of international efforts to improve our
understanding of the climate system and its governing processes, and to
develop the much-needed predictive modelling capabilities. The
tremendous progress in understanding exhibited by the Third IPCC
Assessment Report can be attributed in part to the collaborative
international research efforts promoted within the WCRP projects. These
contribute significantly to the scientific underpinning, which is so
crucial for the integrity of the IPCC assessments, by focusing on the
nature and predictability of seasonal variations of the climate system
at global and regional scales, and on the detection and attribution of
climate change, and projecting the magnitude and rate of human-induced
climate change, its regional variations and sea-level rise. WCRP
projects are being continually updated and re-orientated to respond to
research priorities identified in the IPCC Assessment reports.

In the context of this Workshop, a most relevant WCRP project is the
Climate Variability and Predictability (CLIVAR) study, which aims at
understanding both natural climate variability and human-induced climate
change, as well as extend the range and accuracy of
seasonal-to-interannual climate predictions. It focuses on the natural
variability of the coupled climate system and the changes in response to
natural processes and human influences.

Another major and highly relevant WCRP core project is the Global Energy
and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX), which focuses on the atmospheric and
thermodynamic processes that determine the global hydrological cycle and
energy budget, and their adjustments to global changes such as the
increase in greenhouse gases. High priority continues to be given to
assembling the unique global climatological data sets needed to provide
information on radiation, clouds, water vapour, aerosols and rainfall,
blending the best available observations from surface and space-based
systems. Also, land-surface processes including treatment of soil
moisture, run off and land-use change are being investigated. A new WCRP
project devoted to studying the role of the cryosphere in climate has
been formulated and implementation has begun.

These projects form the basis of climate models that are used for
climate change projections and the WCRP continues to give high priority
in dealing with related uncertainties, especially those identified in
the IPCC Third Assessment Report. Additionally, WCRP will continue to
give emphasis to the development of an active programme of
intercomparison of the simulations of climate models. In this
connection, a new phase of coupled ocean-atmosphere model
intercomparison is now being planned. This new database of climate model
intercomparison is expected to be available by 2004, in good time for
the next IPCC Assessment Report planned for completion in 2007. WCRP is
also involved in the process of identifying the main questions and
issues of climate feedback and will explore methods of analysis of
highly non-linear complex systems from other disciplines in order to
select new approaches that could be applied in the climate area.

Furthermore, in order to draw on the expertise of other groups, WCRP is
also working closely with the International Geosphere-Biosphere
Programme (IGBP) in planning the Coupled Carbon Cycle Climate Model
Intercomparison Project.

The IPCC is now commencing its Fourth Assessment, which is expected to
provide clearer and detailed statement of the extent of climate change
including regional effects, climate variability, extreme events, a
better understanding of the physical processes driving climate change,
improved development of scenarios and a more sophisticated analysis of
adaptation and mitigation options. Before completion of the Fourth
Assessment Report, the IPCC will also provide a number of Special
Reports that will assist the UNFCCC processes. As a co-sponsor of the
IPCC, the WMO will continue to do all it can to assist the Panel as it
works with the best scientists and technologists throughout the world to
carry out these assessments.

It must also be noted that the improved understanding of climate issues
at a scientific level by itself is not sufficient. User communities as
well as the media and the public need the scientific findings about the
climate system, including routine predictions on a range of time- and
space- scales, to be presented in reliable, trusted and practical ways.
This will allow them to understand and apply such information
effectively in a wide range of environmental, social and economic
sectors. In this way, it will also be possible to gain their support in
the event that difficult choices have to be made to protect our climate.
It is important, therefore, that nations develop the capacity to produce
a range of climate services that will complement daily weather
information and services, which are now taken for granted. WMO is
addressing this challenge within the overall context of sustainable
development. In particular, WMO\'s Climate Information and Prediction
Services (CLIPS) project contributes to the application of climate
knowledge and information for the benefit of society in a number of
areas. Ultimately, the important issues relate to how climate, climate
variability, and climate change impinge upon the human condition in such
areas as health, water availability, food security, energy generation,
habitat and the environment. In this context, existing international
collaboration should be reinforced and new multidisciplinary avenues
explored to address the research and application issues in innovative
ways.

Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

From the above, it is pertinent to recommend that the following are
taken into consideration in the final Strategic Plan that would emerge
from this workshop.

First, there is a need to work closely with National Meteorological and
Hydrological Services (NMHSs) in the development and strengthening of an
improved observation networks for monitoring and detecting climate
change. This would help to fill in data gaps in space and time,
especially in developing countries, over the oceans and in polar
regions. This effort should be coordinated with WMO\'s and other
relevant data gathering, archiving and processing programmes, for
example, through the Integrated Global Observing Strategy partnership;

Second, continued and increased research should be undertaken to better
understand the processes that are important in climate, and to
incorporate this understanding into models that can help us simulate
better the global climate system and to anticipate future changes at
various time and space scales;

Third, there should be clear appreciation of the fact that climate
change is a global problem and therefore all nations need to work across
geopolitical boundaries to deal with it. On this basis, observations,
research and community responses require some degree of coordination so
as to identify priorities for action, to prevent duplication of effort
or competing responses, and to identify serious gaps that need to be
filled. Consequently, there is the need to have the appropriate
international linkages with scientists in both developed and developing
countries alike;

Fourth, there is a need to evolve innovative and sustainable means of
raising resources in support of observations and research directly
related to climate change;

Fifth, appropriate measures should be developed for increasing the level
of awareness about climate change at policy level, and of the public and
the media, through effective communication between the scientific
community and all stakeholders; and

Sixth, clear indication should be given of both short- and long-term
goals (and related projects) that take into account the needs of all
stakeholders, and whose achievement could be translated into actions.

In conclusion, I wish the workshop every success in achieving its goals.
It stands out as a landmark event in our effort to address the
challenges posed by global climate change. Its success will contribute
in no small way to protect our climate for future generations of
humankind.

Thank you.