Sri Lanka to strengthen collaboration with the World Meteorological Organization

The Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Petteri Taalas has promised to collaborate with Sri Lanka in strengthening Meteorological Services for forecasting purposes, which will be more cost-effective and could help avoid calamities caused by changes in weather patterns. 

He said the WMO was in the process of finding more resources to assist developing countries and that greater opportunities would be provided to Sri Lanka for capacity-building and technological upgrading. 

The Secretary General made these comments when he met Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva Ambassador Ravinatha Aryasinha recently at the WMO headquarters in Geneva. Associated with the Ambassador were visiting senior officials of the Department of Meteorology of Sri Lanka - D.A. Jayasinghearachchi – Director; A.K. Karunanayake - Director and C.G. Premachandra - Meteorologist.

The Secretary General stressed the need to transfer knowledge from developed countries to developing countries. He also expressed his interest to interact with individual governments and convince them to allocate adequate resources for meteorological services.

Ambassador Aryasinha extended an invitation to the Secretary General and senior staff of the WMO to visit Sri Lanka to consolidate cooperation between Sri Lanka and the WMO. 

The visiting Sri Lankan officials also held technical discussions with Dr. Chung Kyu Park - Director, Regional Office for Asia and the South West Pacific and Dr. Yinka Adebayo - Director, Education and Training Office. Here the WMO expressed commitment to strengthen engagement between the WMO and the Department of Meteorology of Sri Lanka. The Director/Education and Training of WMO promised that two fellowships will be made available in 2018 for the officials of the Department of Meteorology to pursue postgraduate studies in meteorology. 

Officials of the Department of Meteorology and the Mission in Geneva are in the process of preparing a Programme of Action to be agreed on with the WMO, to systematise future cooperation between Sri Lanka and the WMO.