MET info to reach up to 50 percent Malawians with sms service
Department of Meteorological Services said it is expected to reach up to 50 per cent of Malawians with weather, climate and climate change information through short messages (sms) by 2015.
Chief Meteorologist responsible for Climate Change, Clement Boyce said Wednesday that his department will soon partner with World Food Program (WFP) to upscale the service across the country.
“WFP has shown interest to partner with us in order to update Agricultural community on weather and climate information especially through their Lead farmers,” he said.
Currently, he said, the department has partnered with the Red Cross Society in Malawi and Christian Aid to help in sending the sms using their existing structures in some of the districts they operate.
“We agreed with the organisations to help people with information of weather and climate so that they can take precautionary measures in their various socio-economic activities,” he said.
He cited Salima district where Red Cross operate that they normally send sms on weather on Lake Malawi to caution those who are in to fishing business and other climate information while in Nsanje and Chikwawa they are given climate and Climate Change messages.
Boyce said the type of messages which normally reach people reads “Today expect a lot of rains…”, “Today expect strong winds on the lake…” among others in vernacular.
Follow and Subscribe Nyasa TV :
with such effective capacity, you may as well text ppo doing bbq’s, cutting trees n open mining to stop!