World Meteorological Organization

Beneficiary Countries:

16 countries in West Africa: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cabo Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Côte d'Ivoire, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Nigeria, Niger, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.

Regional SWF Centre:

• RSMC-SWF Dakar (web portal since 2018) (password protected)

Other relevant Centres:

• ACMAD (RCC Africa)
• AGRHYMET Regional Centre
• DGM Morocco / NWP LAM (ALADIN NORAF)
• RSMC Barcelona for Sand and Dust forecast (SDS) products & SDS-WAS
• SCOPE - Nowcasting products (by CPTEC INPE Brazil)

Global Centres/WMCs:

• MeteoFrance (NWP data and products)
• Met Office UK (WMC Exeter) (Africa Web Viewer) (log-in require)
• NCEP/NOAA (WMC Washington); GFS/GEFS Meteograms & SkewT-LogP; MJO Forecast & Products; Heat wave products
• WMC ECMWF; ENS Meteograms; and Forecaster User Guide 
• Environment and Climate Change Canada (WMC Montreal)
• DWD (WMC Offenbach) (to access to global ICON Model data); WMC Offenbach graphical products
• CMA (WMC Beijing); Products for Africa including EFI 

Main Focus:

Heavy rain, Strong winds, High sea (swell), High temperature (heat waves conditions), Low temperature (cold waves conditions)

Present Status:

In Phase-IV (sustain operations and continue further developments)

Download:

Regional Subproject Implementation Plan (RSIP) (version 2017/2018)

           RSIP (French version)               RSIP (English version)

• CREWS-West Africa (2018-2023); CREWS-Central Africa (2022-2026); & CREWS in-country projects in the sub-region (since 2018)
• Korean Meteorological Administration (KMA) funded project to kick start the process (2015-2017) 

SWFP implementation in West Africa

In February 2015, the Regional Association I (Africa), at its sixteenth session (RA I-16, Praia, Cabo Verde), requested the Secretary-General and the then Commission for Basic Systems (CBS) to consider SWFDP expansion to the rest of Africa, starting with West Africa. Accordingly, WMO Secretariat, with seed funding from Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA), initiated the process to respond to the regional requirements. For this purpose, in May 2015, a mission to Senegal Meteorological Service (ANACIM) was carried out to gather information on  operational capacity of ANACIM and to discuss how the RSMC Dakar could further benefit from the SWFDP and play its role within the project.  Later, in November 2015, a technical workshop on severe weather forecasting and warning services in Western and Central Africa was organized with following main objectives:

• to understand operational capabilities of countries in the sub-region in preparing and delivering forecasts and warnings;
• to train the participants on the use of severe weather forecasting products and public weather services; and
• to develop outline of the implementation plan.

The development of project website was initiated by RSMC Dakar in 2016. In September 2017, a Technical Planning Meeting on the implementation of SWFDP in West Africa (Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire) developed the regional subproject implementation plan (RSIP). The meeting was attended by representatives of NMHSs from nine countries in the sub-region in addition to attendance and contributions by potential global and regional centres.  The preparatory work by the global centres to make available NWP products including EPSgrams and enhancement of project website at RSMC Dakar continued in 2018. An SWFDP Regional Training Workshop was organized in Lomé, Togo in November 2018 to develop capacity of operational staff on interpretation of NWP products and satellite information to improve severe weather forecasting and warning services, and to train the NMHSs to prepare for demonstration phase. The workshop was attended by operational staff from all 15 participating countries. The demonstration phase of the subproject was started from 1 January 2019. The Eighteenth World Meteorological Congress (Cg-18, June 2019) through its Resolution 15 (Cg-18) decided, among others, to remove the 'demonstration' designation of the SWFDP and renamed it as Severe Weather Forecasting programme (SWFP). Subsequently, the SWFDP-West Africa also became SWFP-West Africa

Year

SWFP-West Africa: Activities & Milestones since 2015

• CREWS/SWFP- West and Central Africa Training Workshop on Severe Weather and Impact-based Forecasting and Warning Services (Monrovia, Liberia, 8-12 May, 2023) (mainly for non-francophone countries)

• CREWS / SWFP – West and Central Africa Training Workshop / Atelier de formation de CREWS/SWFP Afrique de l’Ouest et Centrale sur les services de prévision et d’alerte axés sur les impacts des phénomènes météorologiques extrêmes  (N'Djaména, 23 au 27 mai 2022) (mainly for francophone countries)

• CREWS/ SWFP – West and Central Africa - Training Workshop on Severe Weather and Impact Based Forecasting and Warning Services (ONLINE, 25 May - 3 June 2021) 

• Meeting of the Regional Sub-programme Management Team (RSMT) of SWFP-West Africa (ONLINE, 19 May 2020) to review the sub-programme progress (Meeting Report)

• Eighteenth World Meteorological Congress (Cg-18, June 2019) through its Resolution 15 (Cg-18) decided among others to remove the 'demonstration' designation of the SWFDP and renamed it as Severe Weather Forecasting programme (SWFP). Subsequently, the SWFDP-West Africa became SWFP-West Africa
• Start of Demonstration phase from 1 January 2019

• Launch of RSMC Dakar web portal
• CREWS/SWFDP-West Africa Regional Training Workshop on Severe Weather Forecasting and Delivery of Warning Services (Lomé, 20-30 November 2018)

• Technical Planning Meeting on the implementation of Severe Weather Forecasting Demonstration Project (SWFDP) in West Africa (Abidjan, Ivory Coast, 4-8 September 2017) (Meeting Report: FR version, EN version)

• Development of project website at RSMC Dakar initiated

• Technical workshop on severe weather forecasting and warning services in West and Central Africa (Dakar, Senegal, 2-6 November 2015) (Meeting Report (FR))
• WMO mission to Senegal Meteorological Service (ANACIM) in May 2015 to gather information and discuss how the RSMC Dakar would play its role within the framework SWFDP