DROUGHT MONITORING CENTRE-NAIROBI  FOR THE GREATER HORN OF AFRICA(GHA)
BACKGROUND AND HISTORY
The Horn of Africa, like many other parts of the tropics, are prone to extreme climate events such as droughts and floods. These extreme events have severe negative impacts on key socio-economic sectors of all the countries in the sub-region.

In an effort to minimise the negative impacts of extreme climate events and take advantage of the good years, 24 countries in the eastern and southern African sub-region under the auspices of WMO and UNDP established a regional Drought Monitoring Centre (DMC) in Nairobi and a sub-centre in Harare in 1989.   

The main objective of the DMC was to contribute to monitoring, prediction, early warning and mitigation of adverse impacts of extreme climatic events on agricultural production and food security, water resources, energy, and health among other socio-economic sectors. Since the establishment of DMC in 1989, the centre has played an important and useful role in providing the sub-region with weather and climate advisories and more importantly, timely advance warnings on droughts, floods and other extreme climate related events. 

At the end of the UNDP funded Project in 1998 and due to the increased demand for climate information and prediction services, the Nairobi and Harare components now operate independently and are referred to as the Drought Monitoring Centre, Nairobi (DMCN) and the Drought Monitoring Centre, Harare (DMCH). DMCN caters for countries in IGAD and other countries in the Horn of Africa region, while DMCH is responsible for countries in southern Africa.

The 8th Summit of the Heads of State and Government that was held in Khartoum in November 2000 adopted DMC as a specialised institution of IGAD.

 
COMPONENTS OF THE DMCN:

The participating countries are:-

 Burundi,  Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya,  Rwanda,  Somalia, Sudan,  Tanzania, and Uganda,

OBJECTIVES OF THE DMCN

The best strategies to minimize negative impacts associated with the climate extremes are enhanced monitoring and timely availability of weather and climate information and prediction products, together with the availability of effective disaster preparedness policies.

The main mission of the current DMCN is  timely climate Informatin and prediction services and enhanced Applications of such products in order to reduce climate and weather related risks to food security, water resources and health for sustainable  development in the Greater Horn of Africa”.

OPERATIONAL ACTIVITIES:


ABOUT DMCN PRODUCTS

 Ten day (dekadal) weather advisories:

Monthly  and seasonal products: These products are disseminated to all national meteorological and hydrological services of the participating countries to serve as early warning information to a variety of sectoral users of meteorological information and products including policy makers, planners, health, energy, agricultural and water resource sectors, farmers as well as research institutions among others.

Modes of Data and Products Exchange:

Data used: Major Achievements:
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