01/27/06 Global Earth Observations

Weather is one of the key aspects of the lives of those whose livelihood involves agriculture. Most of those producers and agribusiness types rely on local weather and frost forecasts like what you hear on this radio station, a combination of meteorologists' best guesses using both local radar and U.S. satellite information. With those tools, weather experts can usually produce a fairly accurate forecast over a one to two day period. But on the horizon is a system that could result in great benefits for ag producers, and the weather related decisions they make on a daily, weekly, even monthly basis. It is the newly agreed upon Global Earth Observation System, or G.E.O.S. A group of climate experts representing sixty countries around the world, including the U.S., are in the process of setting up this new system, which was agreed upon by participating nations last February. So U.S.D.A. meteorologist Mark Russburg, what is the purpose of G.E.O.S.? RUSSBERG: What that will do will encourage countries to share their global and regional and local weather data observations. From the U.S. standpoint, that would mean more satellite ocean buoy weather station, other surface and airborne earth observing data from the instruments maintained by those countries. The end result will be an access to what would be considered an unprecedented amount of environmental information that could be integrated into new data products and it would benefit societies and economies world wide. One of the primary benefits expected from G.E.O.S. is that it would foster more accurate short term local forecasts and increase the accuracy of long range climate forecasts. From a natural disaster preparation standpoint, U.S.D.A. Secretary Mike Johanns says G.E.O.S. would& JOHANNS: Reduce loss of life and property and disasters. Protect and monitor our ocean resources. But what then is the benefit for those who rely on weather information for their livelihood, those in agriculture? Johanns says he can see a brave new world for those in agriculture, and based on the work being conducted on G.E.O.S., it may happen soon. JOHANNS: Imagine the benefits as farmers could plan ahead more precisely, maximizing their resources, and therefore their output. What if we could better understand and predict drought and flood seasons years in advance, and adjust our plans and our cropping practices, and respond accordingly to those predictions?