Ecoinformatics Problems of Global Climate Change - New Ecoinformatics Tools in Environmental Science: Applications and Decision-making - page 372

AMMA has two phases: (1) 2002 2020 ( http://badc.nerc.ac.uk/

view/badc.nerc.ac.uk__ATOM__dataent_amma ) . AMMA is an international pro-
ject to improve our knowledge and understanding of the West African Monsoon
(WAM) and its variability. AMMA is motivated by an interest in fundamental
scienti

2010 and (2) 2010

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c issues and by the societal need for improved prediction of the West
African Monsoon and its impacts on West African nations. The societal need to
develop strategies that reduce the socioeconomic impacts of the variability of the
West African Monsoon forces the AMMA will facilitate the multidisciplinary
research required to provide improved predictions of the WAM and its impacts.
AMMA promotes international coordination of ongoing activities, basic research
and a multi-year campaign over West Africa and the tropical Atlantic. AMMA
develops close partnerships between those involved in basic research of the West
African Monsoon, operational forecasting and decision making, and it will establish
blended training and education activities for African technical institutions and
schools.
The observational programs of special importance include the Third Interna-
tional Polar Year (IPY) planned for 2007 - 2009 with coordination carried out by the

scienti c enterprising group CliC on the problems of climate and cryosphere. First

IPY was realized in 1932 - 1933 and second IPY occurred 75 years after the rst

IPY (1957 1958). The latest IPY brought about the most ambitious Arctic climate

change research project ever undertaken in Canada, a CAD research program called
the Circumpolar Flaw Lead (CFL) System Study. Led by University of Manitoba
Professor David Barber, a Canada Research Chair, the project involved more than
300 scientists from 16 countries, including over 40 faculty members, research
associates, graduate students, technicians and support staff from the University of
Manitoba.
The THORPEX program should be more informative and longer-term. This
international programme of atmospheric studies planned for 10 years is carried out
under aegis of the WMO Commission on Atmospheric Sciences and is a part of the
World Weather Research Programme (WWRP). The main goal of the programme is
to work out methods of weather prediction (especially its manifestations which
especially strongly affect humans

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life and economic activity) with an adequate use
of the data of conventional and satellite observations. The THORPEX should
culminate in a 1-year global meteorological experiment during the period 2010

'

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2015. The fundamental problem of exclusive importance is the development of a
full-scale system of global climate observations (GCOS) to obtain long and
homogeneous series of high-quality data on the climate system parameters, bearing
in mind the solution of the following set of problems (Steffen et al. 2004):

Climate monitoring for quantitative estimates of natural climate change in a
wide range of spatial-temporal scales and for recognition of anthropogenic
climate change.

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￿ Detection and quantitative estimates of various (especially anthropogenic)

factors of climate change.