A brief introduction of the World Meteorological Organization
A brief introduction of the World Meteorological Organization
WU Man-chi and WOO Wang-chun
April 2021
You have probably come across the “World Health Organization (WHO)” in the light of the pandemic, but have you ever heard of the “World Meteorological Organization (WMO)”, another specialized agency under the United Nations? Now let us take this opportunity to introduce it to you briefly.
Being one of the specialized agencies of the United Nations, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is an intergovernmental organization exclusively focuses on the state and behaviour of the Earth’s atmosphere, its interaction with the land and oceans, the weather and climate it produces, and the resulting distribution of water resources. One of its major roles is to facilitate world-wide co-operation in observations, research and services in meteorology and hydrology.
The WMO was established in 1950 to succeed the International Meteorological Organization (IMO). The WMO now has 193 Member States and Territories (as of 23 March 2021). Hong Kong joined IMO in 1948 and became a member of the WMO upon its establishment. The membership was retained as "Hong Kong, China" from 1 July 1997 onwards. The Director of the Hong Kong Observatory (HKO) is the Permanent Representative of Hong Kong, China with the WMO. Many colleagues of HKO have participated in WMO activities, including international conferences, symposiums and workshops etc. Currently, there are 20 HKO colleagues and three university professors in Hong Kong serving as chair, vice-chair or member of various technical commissions, standing committees, study groups and expert teams under the WMO. HKO was also invited by the WMO to develop and operate the websites “World Weather Information Service (WWIS)”[1], “Severe Weather Information Centre (SWIC)”[2], “International Cloud Atlas (ICA)”[3] and etc.
The World Meteorological Day takes place on the 23rd of March every year to commemorate the entry into force of the “Convention of World Meteorological Organization” on 23rd March 1950. World Meteorological Day has a theme each year and it is "The Ocean, our climate and weather” in 2021.
Lastly, do you know anything about the logo of the WMO? It is in fact a compass rose on top of the United Nations logo. You may wish to think about its meaning and to visit the WMO’s official website to know more about WMO.
Figure 1 The official website of WMO.
Remarks:
[1] The WWIS website provides the global community with official weather forecasts and monthly climates of major cities supplied by the National Meteorological and Hydrological services (NMHSs) around the world.
[2] The SWIC website specializes on providing official observations and warnings of severe weather such as tropical cyclone, heavy rain and thunderstorm.
[3] The ICA webpage categorizes clouds and atmospheric phenomena systematically and shows attractive weather photos from all over the world.
[1] The WWIS website provides the global community with official weather forecasts and monthly climates of major cities supplied by the National Meteorological and Hydrological services (NMHSs) around the world.
[2] The SWIC website specializes on providing official observations and warnings of severe weather such as tropical cyclone, heavy rain and thunderstorm.
[3] The ICA webpage categorizes clouds and atmospheric phenomena systematically and shows attractive weather photos from all over the world.