What’s the weather like?

The National Business

National Weather Service director SAMUEL MAIHA says in that this age of climate change and technology, weather service is important for development.
MICHAEL LAI reports.

THE PNG National Weather Service has immense potential to contribute to socio-economic development in this age of climate change and technology.
Director Samuel Maiha says NWS is in the process of recruiting 20 meteorologists and weather observers who can provide information to six socio-economic sectors in PNG.
These sectors are:

  • Agriculture and food security;
  • water and energy;
  • health;
  • marine resources and fisheries;
  • transport and infrastructure development; and,
  • Tourism

Climate-related risks are involved in these sectors and climatological specialists are needed to map them out.
Maiha says the recruitment will take the organisation forward.
“We will to be recruiting very good, innovative candidates also who have added advantage of information technology and communications,” he says.
“What we are trying to create is a kind of high-tech organisation that uses comprehensive data sets, that are set, and signals are received from every part of the country.
“This will help us come up with special risk-based maps that can prove very beneficial to the different socio-economic sectors.
“The trainees or applicants will have to go through a very-stringent screening process because we want to get the best.
“According to our strategic plan, we will provide training to them.”
Maiha says the candidates will be trained with the support of aid donors.

Agriculture and food security
Information about rainfall, temperatures, humidity, floods and landslide is vital to farmers.
“Some pests depend on the weather,” Maiha says.
“Cocoa, for instance. Just from the temperature and amount of rainfall, we can predict that there is going to be high risk of cocoa pod borer,
“I think proper chemicals need to be applied in time, before the epidemic reaches its worst level, so commodities like cocoa are not affected.
“The same applies with coffee and potatoes. Different pests depend on the weather.
“Knowing the optimum conditions in which the pests multiply can really help in terms of managing different commodities.
“Take a crop that is a lifeline for many citizens, like potato, for instance.
“If we know the optimum temperature and monitor it properly, via the use of GIS (geographic information system), we can estimate when we combine temperature and rainfall data with the physiology of that particular pests, optimum conditions in which that pests develops.
“We can turn that into a risk that we can manage.
“If you deny the lifeline to people, they will resort to things like law and order.
“We want smart climatologists to assist in the provinces.
“We really want weather personnel to be actively involved in each of the sectors.”
Maiha says Government’s focus on agriculture in rural areas must be in partnership with NWS.
“Ultimately, the provinces depend on their own internal revenue,” he said. “This can support them manage their internal commodities as well, especially if they have plantations.
“They can better estimate how much revenue they will make.
“If we have a very good monitoring system, we can manage the risks to productivity.”

Green energy
“Hydro is a cheap energy while fossil fuel is expensive,” Maiha says.
“A province that depends on green energy like hydro, which is cheap energy, can actually control the amount of money that they spend on fossil fuel.
“This is linked to the weather.
“What we intend to do is have a climatologist working with the energy sector.
“They set up stations in each of the hydropower dams so they can monitor and predict the future – whether rainfall will keep coming.
“They can maximise their use of cheap energy so they can save and increase revenue to the province.
“They use hydro during the rainy season and solar energy during the dry season. This is where solar energy and hydro power will do shifts to produce electricity, as chosen by the consumers, with the motive to save.
“At the moment, our economy is pushed on by the extractive industry. PNG needs to prepare itself for years when there will not be that much minerals out there.
“Over the next 30 years, towards 2050, we need to prepare and diversify our economy, make sure the different sectors that make up our economy are better managed.
“I think that prudent management cannot be done without the Weather Service.”

Marine and fisheries
“We cannot stop extreme events like rising sea levels, floods and so forth, the weather events,” Maiha says.
“What we can do is we can know the risks.
“Weather is far more important than just monitoring rising sea levels and waves.
“Government is making millions of kina on the sale of fish and marine resources.
“Climatologists can predict the best conditions of the weather in the sea, and which school of fish or marine resources breed during a certain weather condition.
“We prefer to recruit people with marine science background, so when we teach climatology, they are able to monitor and inform the provinces and the country.
“Basically, in a nutshell, what we are saying is to create a PNG that is science-informed in this age of climate change.
“To come up with a product, as per science information, we need to peruse accurate data and comprehensive data from all parts of the country.
“That is why we are proposing automatic weather stations in every district as a priority.
“Over the next couple of years, we have an idea to have one automatic weather station in each of the districts. That will make PNG really fortunate in terms of having access to excellent data service.
“That results in excellent products.
“That will consequently result in a PNG that is better informed in terms of the risks to each of the sectors.”

Transport and infrastructure
“Weather plays a vital role in infrastructure development,” Maiha says.
“The Weather Office is vitally used by transport, predicting rainfall, floods and landslides.
“If specialist weather officers are set in each district, we can give good sets of rainfall, temperatures, humidity, flood and landslide data.
“These can help improve the planning of infrastructure.
“As you know, we are having very regular floods just about every year from Nov to April (monsoon season).
“We are going to be experiencing extreme floods, and definitely they would be infrastructure-affected.
“As we go on, there is more and more heat energy in the ocean with global warming, so the risks of flooding will be the major threat to the different sectors and the economy of PNG.”

Tourism
“Tourists also want to know the best time to visit the provinces in the country,” Maiha says.
“Climate is very important for them as well.
“They don’t visit when the temperature is very hot, or very windy where strong winds may disturb trips in the sea and those kind of things. If we can put automatic weather stations in every hotel, we can hotel-manage the hotel industries as well, so we can partner them.
“They don’t want to go with roads being flooded, slippery.”

Health sector
“For health, when the temperature is very hot, you have high risks of mosquito bites and an increase in malaria.
“These kinds of risks are recorded by Weather Office.
“They all depend on the weather.”