Gambia Media practitioners urged to disseminate climate information to communities

The seminar, on the theme, “improving the dissemination of weather forecasts and climate services in The Gambia”, availed the opportunity to foster collaboration between meteorologists and the media.

The initiative was described as critical especially taking into account the fact that despite daily forecasts by the Water Resources Department, public access to information is low due to hurdles such as language barriers, poor targeting of users’ needs, low media interest in dissemination amongst others. 

Given The Gambia as a country that depends mainly on favourable climate conditions for socio-economic development, coupled with the increased frequency and intensity of extreme climate events as a result of climate change, officials described as “key” the need for stakeholders to have knowledge of future weather conditions at all times.

In his remarks, the minister of Fisheries and Water Resources, Mass Axi Gye, underscored the importance of the seminar and stressed the need for more collaboration between the media and providers of the weather and climate services so as to filter the information to the targeted beneficiaries. He said climate, both a resource and hazard, is a cross-cutting issue that has spared no one, thus the need for all and sundry to be involved in it.

Disaster risk reduction and water resource management, the minister stressed, will play a crucial role in determining the achievement of the country’s Programme for Accelerated Growth and Employment (PAGE). Since the dominant part of the national economy thrives on the exploitation of the non-mineral resources, he noted, climate is certainly the key resource to the development of The Gambia. But as important as the climate is to the human kind, the Fisheries minister cautioned that no one has control over it. 

“As a progressive developing nation under the leadership of His Excellency Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr. Yahya Jammeh, The Gambia like other countries of the world, is fully committed to the challenges of the climate. As an active member of WMO, my Ministry has left no stone unturned in working with the global community to harness opportunities offered by favourable climate outcomes and reduce the risk from the unfavourable climate events,” he indicated.

The deputy director of the Department of Water Resources, Bernard Gomez, said despite the complexity of the climate system, the application of scientific knowledge have ensured that many a time, information on the future conditions of the atmosphere are known before they occur. But for the information to serve its purpose, he stressed the need to fully integrate knowledge of the rate, monitoring prediction, dissemination of the information and response. 

“Information on the future behavior of the atmosphere is key in decision-making at the individual and collective levels. The need for partnership between providers of the weather and climate services and the media is indeed very strong,” he acknowledged.

 Given that information is powerful, Gomez stressed that the two sectors must collaborate to provide communities with the necessary information to support their livelihoods and to save lives.

The consultant and facilitator of the seminar, Oumy Khairy Ndiaye, who has been hired by WMO to facilitate workshops in the context of communication strategy of met-agric for a number of sub-regional countries, enunciated the significance of partnership between the two sectors. She informed that one components of the above stated communication strategy is to enhance the relations between experts of the weather and climate service and the media.

The Senegalese-born expert, who took participants through the topics of the workshop, opined that weather forecast and climate services can dramatically enhance agricultural production.

The seminar also saw presentations by Ismaila Senghore of The Gambia Radio and Television Services (GRTS), as well as other resource persons.