Mozambique’s minister of transport and communications said on Thursday that the country needs seven meteorological radars to improve weather forecasting capacity, pointing out that the territory is exposed to the impact of extreme climate change.
“The country needs seven radars but only has one [and] has mobilised resources to buy two more,” said Mateus Magala during the presentation of a report on the country’s climate.
This is long-range weather forecasting equipment – 400 kilometres in radius and 800 kilometres in diameter – said Magala.
He noted that Mozambique is one of the countries most vulnerable to climate change and has not escaped the increase in temperature that has recently been registered around the world.
In 2023, he continued, the country would see an annual average temperature rise of 0.7 degrees Celsius, above the annual average for the period between 1980 and 2022, in line with an increase across the planet.
Mozambique is considered one of the countries most severely affected by climate change in the world, facing cyclical floods and tropical cyclones during the rainy season, which runs from October to April.
The 2018/2019 rainy season was one of the most severe on record in Mozambique: 714 people died, including 648 victims of cyclones Idai and Kenneth, two of the biggest ever to hit the country.
In the first quarter of last year, heavy rains and the passage of Cyclone Freddy caused 306 deaths, affected more than 1.3 million people in the country, and destroyed 236,000 homes and 3,200 classrooms, according to official government figures.
Lusa
