Weather agency unveils new plan, to offer 80 jobs
Mr Moses Tumusiime, a senior meteorologist at the Directorate of Water Resource Management (Left), explains how readings are taken off an Anemometer to the UNDP Resident Representative, Ms Rosa Malango, (Right) and Mr Wilson Kwamya, the Team Leader, Growth and Poverty Reduction, at UNDP in Uganda. FILE PHOTO
KAMPALA- The Uganda National Meteorological Authority (UNMA) has unveiled a blueprint that includes lining up more than 80 job offers in a move aimed at revamping weather forecasting in the country.
According to the plan seen by this paper, the weather authority will need at least Shs1.36b to establish and maintain 325 rainfall stations, transmit resulting data and also pay salaries of observers.
[“There is] staffing gap in the approved staffing structure where only 74 instead of 156 field technical staff for the 45 major stations are provided for,” reads the plan in part.
Until 2014 when the then meteorological department turned into an authority, only three of the 12 weather stations were seen on the Telecommunication System (GTS) and only 40 per cent of 1,040 rain gauges across the country were functional. Telecommunication System are networks through which weather data is transmitted.
Also, only 10 per cent of the country had Automatic Weather Stations. This led to weather agency’s forecast to be disputed by the public.
Automatic Weather Stations (AWS)are computerised stations that read measurements as opposed to traditional ones where they were recorded and read by human beings.
The UNMA director-station networks and observations, Mr Paul Isabirye, said the situation is gradually improving and more support is needed.
“The coverage of AWS has improved from 10 per cent to 29 per cent against the National Development Plan (NDPII) target of 40 per cent by 2019/2020,” he said.
Since the collapse of the first East African Community, there was a progressive degeneration of the weather observation infrastructure under the defunct Department of Meteorology in the Ministry of Water and Environment.
But with the ongoing revamp, Mr Isabirye said a number of districts have provided land for UNMA meteorological installations, an indication that local governments are increasingly embracing the need for weather information.
In a recent tour of UNMA stations and a school in Entebbe, Wakiso District by Parliament’s committee on Natural Resources, UNMA executive director, Festus Luboyera, asked Ugandans to trust the weather information and use it for planning purposes.
“Right now, you cannot plan without weather information. We give you this information such that you plan for this country,” he said.
His comments followed remarks made by Kabale Municipality MP Andrew Baryayanga that Ugandans are still skeptical of Unma’s forecast accuracy.
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