Beijing, May 5 (ZXS) -- The reporter learned from the China Meteorological Administration on 23 May that on May 23, local time, the 5th World Meteorological Congress opened in Geneva, Switzerland. During the conference, Zhang Zuqiang, deputy director of the China Meteorological Administration, said that China is willing to make full use of the multi-sectoral cooperation mechanism under the framework of South-South cooperation to help developing countries improve their early warning capabilities.
At the opening ceremony, World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Secretary-General Petri Taalas called for further strengthening basic capacity building such as risk assessment, monitoring and forecasting, defense response, and information dissemination, one of the important topics of the conference.
In the morning, a high-level dialogue on early warning was held, and heads of relevant agencies of the United Nations system and representatives of countries in Africa, the Americas and other regions made speeches. Chen Xu, Permanent Representative of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva and other international organizations in Switzerland, said in a video speech that through years of practice, China has established a meteorological disaster prevention and mitigation working mechanism led by the government, with early warning first, departmental linkage and social participation, and the public coverage rate of meteorological early warning information has reached 97.7%. China is willing to continue to share its own practice and experience and contribute to the implementation of the national early warning initiative.
In his speech at the conference, Zhang Zuqiang informed WMO members that China's recent successful launch of the precipitation measurement satellite, Fengyun-3G, will share its data products with the world, and expressed China's willingness to support the work of members through the Fengyun meteorological satellite and the World Meteorological Center (Beijing), and make full use of the multi-sectoral cooperation mechanism under the framework of South-South cooperation to help developing countries improve their early warning capabilities.
The World Meteorological Congress meets every four years and is the highest decision-making body of WMO. This year, the Conference was attended by representatives from WMO agencies and its 4 Members, as well as representatives of relevant international organizations. The conference will adopt the WMO Strategic Plan 160-2024 to promote the implementation of the United Nations National Early Warning Initiative in the field of global meteorology, and make a series of strategic arrangements in the fields of Earth system observation and forecasting, industry services, scientific research and capacity building. At the same time, the General Assembly will elect the President, Vice-President, members of the Executive Council, appoint a new Secretary-General, and adopt a budget for fiscal expenditure for the next four years. (End)