HR: 17:50h
AN: U34B-07    [Abstracts]
TI: Establishing an Ongoing Binational U.S.-Mexico Border Climate Diagnostic Summary: Developing a Prototype and Navigating the Institutional Landscape
AU: * Garfin, G
EM: gmgarfin@email.arizona.edu
AF: CLIMAS/ISPE University of Arizona, 715 N. Park Ave., 2nd Fl., Tucson, AZ 85721-0156, United States
AU: Varady, R
EM: rvarady@email.arizona.edu
AF: Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy University of Arizona, 803 East First Street, Tucson, AZ 85719, United States
AU: Morehouse, B
EM: morehoub@email.arizona.edu
AF: CLIMAS/ISPE University of Arizona, 715 N. Park Ave., 2nd Fl., Tucson, AZ 85721-0156, United States
AU: Wilder, M
EM: mwilder@email.arizona.edu
AF: Center for Latin American Studies University of Arizona, Marshall Building Suite 280 PO Box 210158B , Tucson, AZ 85721-0158, United States
AU: Crawford, B
EM: bercrawf@email.arizona.edu
AF: CLIMAS/ISPE University of Arizona, 715 N. Park Ave., 2nd Fl., Tucson, AZ 85721-0156, United States
AB: In its eighth report to the President and Congress of the United States, the Good Neighbor Environmental Board (an independent federal advisory committee, that advises the President and Congress on environmental practices and infrastructure needs along the U.S. border with Mexico) noted that management of water resources issues along the U.S. border with Mexico would be aided by data and information sharing. They encouraged agencies and institutions to make data accessible, and to exchange data and information, even on a limited or ad hoc basis, in order to build trust and the capacity for managers and staff on both sides of the border to collaborate and work together to solve problems of mutual interest. Although climate is merely one factor affecting decision makers, it can often be the "straw that breaks the camel's back." Along the arid and semiarid U.S. border with Mexico, population growth, industrialization, increasing water consumption, and other factors have exacerbated societal vulnerability to naturally occurring persistent climate phenomena, such as drought. In 2006, scientists from institutions in the U.S. and Mexico agreed to collaborate to address decision makers' pressing needs for climate information, by developing a climate diagnostic and outlook product in a format usable and easily accessible by managers and policy makers. The Border Climate Summary (Resumen del Climate de la Frontera), modeled after monthly climate newsletters produced in the U.S., provides a tangible and simple information tool to strengthen the basic capacity for climate information to be usefully incorporated into decision processes. The Summary provides forecasts and value-added information on temperature, precipitation, and drought within the region. However, in order for the Summary to be effective at reaching its intended audiences, collaborators must break through barriers posed by regulatory and institutional control. They must also identify key insertion points for climate information or risk that the product of their efforts will end up as another seldom used box of digital information merchandise heaped on the loading dock of the Internet. This presentation describes progress to date in developing a collaborative, binational semi-operational product, obtaining funding, and taking the first steps to establish regional climate services for the U.S.-Mexico border region.
DE: 0815 Informal education
DE: 3309 Climatology (1616, 1620, 3305, 4215, 8408)
DE: 6319 Institutions
DE: 9350 North America
SC: Union [U]
MN: 2007 Joint Assembly