goals. Finally, it also contributes to the hypothesis stating that the provision of access to improved weather forecasting should be the responsibility of higher income countries.

# 4.2 Global public service

As previously stated, value is created only when information is effectively taken into consideration in the decisions or actions of end-users. Therefore, to increase the use and resulting beneficial outcomes of decisions or actions taken from the bulk of global weather and climate products, it should be provisioned as a public service. However, effort made to increase the use of these services should come from those who possess the technology and stand at the top of the value chain, namely higher income countries. Here, the positive outcomes of open data for the promotion of capacity in LICs are considered as well as their potential to promote good leadership and to build trust and freedom at the global level.

LICs’ NMHSs rely heavily on the cascading of information from GPCs and RSMCs to provide efficient information for their end-users. Consequently, the wide use of forecasting information can have farreaching economic and other spillover effects in LICs, including political ones for the governments and organizations providing services at the global, national and local levels. In fact, policies of open data access are known to provide a level playing field and create incentives and opportunities to move out of the poverty trap (GEO 2015). More broadly, these services strengthen delivery of governments’ social contract with their citizens by providing safety and protection from natural disasters, thereby further legitimizing the authority of government (WMO et al 2015; GEO 2015). Of course, LIC governments should not provide forecasting services for these reasons only, but they should acknowledge such positive externalities and demand access to this valuable information nonetheless.

In higher income countries, where the majority of GPCs are located, making products and services available can also provide an antecedent of diplomatic good practice and trust characterized by a good sense of global responsibility, and therefore by more a stringent and well-established ethical code. The building of trust in governance is important in the development process of any nation. Open and unrestricted access to climate and weather information is strongly indicative of the confidence in the public service sector, and is a testament to the maturity of the political system in place and the integrity of the government.

Along with integrity, it also showcases that the government stands for the Universal Human Rights. According to Article 19 of the declaration, the rights to freedom of opinion and expression “includes the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers” (UN 1948). Another passage from Article 27(1) further supports this claim: “Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community (...) and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits” (UN 1948). Thus, from these two quotes we can determine that one of the ultimate goals of any society striving for development is to focus on empowering every citizen through access to and use of forecasting information (GEO 2015).

This should further incentivize governments to encourage more funding allocation to improve the performance of GPCs to provide weather and climate forecasting data to LICs by defining it as a global public service. Further, the UN Secretary-General’s High Level Panel report on the post-2015 agenda called for “a data revolution for sustainable development, with a new international initiative to improve 20