Climate Information Services
Climate Information Services (CIS) is growing in importance in light of the increasingly devastating impacts of climate variability and climate change.
CIS supports decision-makers to anticipate and manage the risks of a changing and variable climate, including early warning early action systems that help build resilience among climate vulnerable communities.
What is Climate Information Services ?
Climate Information (CI) refers to the collection and interpretation of observations of the actual weather and climate as well as simulations of climate in both past and future periods. Climate information is the collection and interpretation of weather and climate data that is credible, relevant and usable.
Climate Information Services (CIS) involves the provision of climate information in a way that assists decision making by individuals and organizations. CIS supports their users to anticipate and manage the risks of a changing and variable climate. It involves a knowledge cycle of access to, interpretation, communication and use of relevant, accurate and reliable climate information by targeted user communities and their feedback on how the information is used.
Want to deepen your knowledge? Explore our free CARE Climate and Resilience Academy online course on Climate Information Services.
Our work on Climate Information Services
CARE engages in a range of climate services work in Africa, Latin America and the Carribean, and the Asia-Pacific.
CIS is integrated within programs on climate change adaptation, climate resilience, disaster risk management, early warning systems, climate resilient agriculture, food and nutrition security, water resource management, health and other sectors, humanitarian response, adaptive social protection and women’s economic empowerment.
CARE uses a wide range of approaches which can be categorized into three main areas:
- Seasonal forecasts and advisories for development and investment decisions based on access and use of interpreted and localized forecasts, in particular, but not limited to the Participatory Scenario Planning (PSP) approach.
- Early Warning Systems (EWS) for enhanced disaster risk reduction and response to extreme events, with a focus on community-based systems and forecast based early action (FBEA).
- Communication services for short term weather and climate information such as innovations using radio, community groups (especially Village Savings and Loans Associations (VSLA) and mobile.
Read more about CARE’s work on Climate Information Services our latest report, Making Decisions in Sunshine and in Rain.
