Assessment of Weather Information Needs and Development of Tailored Messages and Advisories for Fishers,Fish Processors and Fish Tradersin Mangochi, Salima, Nkhotakota and Nkhatabay

The Government of Malawi, with the support from UNDP, has secured funding from the Green Climate Fund to scale up the use of modernized early warning systems (EWS) and climate information in the country. The project will work with communities in disaster prone and food-insecure districts to co-develop tailored weather- and climate-based agricultural advisories to be disseminated through ICT/mobile, print and radio channels. The project will also scale up best practices in community readiness to respond to disasters and mitigate key risks. Community-based EWS will be scaled up in flood-prone areas and capacities to use and respond to warnings will be strengthened at the national, district and community levels.

The project is being implemented in 21 districts by the Department of Disaster Management Affairs (DODMA), in collaboration with the Department of Climate Change and Meteorological Services (DCCMS), Department of Water Resources (DWR), Department of Agricultural Extension Services (DAES), Department of Fisheries (DoF), and the National Smallholder Farmers Association of Malawi (NASFAM).

The project has three expected outputs;

1. Expansion of observation networks that generate climate-related data to save lives and safeguard livelihoods from extreme climate events
2. Development and dissemination of products and platforms for climate-related information/services for vulnerable communities and livelihoods
3. Strengthening communities’ capacities for use of EWS/CI in preparedness for response to climate related disasters
    

Scope of Work:

The key objective of this assignment is to assess the weather and seasonal climate information needs (on different time scales – from 1-10 days to 1-2 months in advance) of fishers and people engaged in fishing activities in Mangochi, Salima, Nkhatabay and Nkhotakota along Lake Malawi. Specifically, the assessment will target fishers, fish processors, fish traders, beach village committees (BVCs) and local leaders to understand what are the key pieces of weather/climate information needed to best manage and plan their activities.  The consultancy firm will assess the adequacy of weather information the communities currently receive, issues around understanding the messages and usefulness of the messages in relation to fishing activities. The assessment will also review how the target communities access weather information and, their confidence in warnings and content of the messages. Importantly the assessment will also identify which weather/climate information is most realistic/possible to predict and/or measure at the required timescales/timeframes. The Department of Climate Change and Meteorological Services (DCCMS) is responsible for generating weather forecasts and the assessment will review the current advisories produced by DCCMS for the fishing communities including the construction of messages (order and content) and, adequacy of warning content (nature of threat, likely impacted areas, intensity, expected consequences and, protective action statement). The assessment will also review the protocols to disseminate, update, correct and cancel the warnings.  The effectiveness of existing warning dissemination methods/channels will also be reviewed to improve faster dissemination of warnings to at risk communities