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16th WMO Congress

Tuesday, 17 May 2011
CICG, Geneva

High-Level Segment – Ministerial Segment

Houlin Zhao

Deputy Secretary-General,
International Telecommunication Union

Mr. Chairman,

Mr. Secretary-General of WMO,

Excellencies,
Distinguished colleagues,
Ladies and gentlemen,

  • It is a pleasure and honour for me to be here today.
  • First of all, I would like to offer you our congratulations to the 16thWMO Congress. I am very pleased to take the floor after Mr.Dayan, Secretary-General of UPU. From his speech, we noted that WMO was created in 1873, and UPU was set up in 1874. I am now pleased to advise you that ITU was founded in 1865. Three of us are old brother organizations. ITU is proud of our excellent record of collaboration and partnership.
  • Today, 17 May, is a very special day for ITU. This morning, ITU celebrated its 146th anniversary. This week is a very busy week for ITU. We are not only celebrating our anniversary, but together with UNESCO, UNDP and UNCTAD, we organize a WSIS Forum starting from Monday 16 May. There are about 2 dozen Ministers who participated in the High-Level Segment of WSIS Forum.
  • WMO focuses its efforts on meeting the needs for meteorological information, and the corresponding radio frequency spectrum resources for its special use. ITU, as the international steward of spectrum, allocates the necessary radio frequencies to allow the interference-free operation of radio-based applications and radiocommunication systems (terrestrial and space) which are used for climate monitoring and prediction, weather forecasting and disaster early warning and detection.
  • This gives us many opportunities to cooperate, with just recent one example being the joint organization of the seminar “Use of Radio Spectrum for Meteorology: Weather, Water and Climate Monitoring and Prediction”.
  • We also co-produced the ITU-WMO handbook on the “Use of Radio Spectrum for Meteorology”, which provides information on the development and proper use radiocommunication systems and radio-based technologies for environment observation, climate control, weather forecasting and natural and man-made disaster prediction, detection and mitigation.
  • ITU Recommendations for modern telecommunication systems and services connect all meteorological service stationseverywhere in the planet. ITU happily assists WMO with the latest ICTs to modernize their systems of communications.
  • As fellow specialized UN agencies, ITU and WMO both strongly support the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, who has put sustainable development right at the top of the agenda for the United Nations in 2011.
  • This is clearly an issue in which information and communication technologies – ICTs – such as satellites, mobile phones or the Internet, have a powerful potential role to play.
  • First, of course, comes the role of ICTs themselves in mitigating climate change. ICTs can radically transform complete public sectors, such as transportation, energy, healthcare or government services, helping countries across the globe to make a more efficient use of energy sources and reduce their greenhouse gases.
  • Second, there is the tremendous role that ICTs play in monitoring, reporting and verification of meteorological record and analyze data.
  • And third, ICTs will play an increasingly important role in adapting to the effects of climate change – from providing vital life-saving warnings ahead of natural disasters and catastrophes, to providing vital communications links once they have occurred.
  • ITU and WMO jointly organized a thematic pavilion on climate change at the ITU Telecom World 2009, which was visited and appreciated by Mr.Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of UN. ITU will organize ITU Telecom World 2011 on 24-27 October 2011 and invite WMO and its members to join the Event as well.
  • ITU will continue to actively cooperate with WMO at every useful opportunity.
  • I wish you a successful Congress and all the best.

Thank you.