The Arab Climate Outlook Forum (ArabCOF), cutting across multiple Regional Associations, was established following the decision of the Executive Office of the Council of Minsters responsible for Meteorology and Climate, under the League of Arab States, endorsed in April 2017.
The Scoping Meeting for the Establishment of the ArabCOF held in Amman, October 2014 agreed on the following key objectives of the forum:
• Generate consensus outputs on seasonal forecasts (1-2 per year) and to carry out regional climate change assessments.
• Facilitate knowledge sharing and exchange for seasonal forecasting and climate change in a common language.
• Capacity building of the Arab Meteorological Offices to generate common approach to ArabCOF outputs.
• Identify climate information needed by end users to respond to those user needs taking into consideration that the data provided by the Arab Met Services to inform the discussions remains the property of the Met Service as represented in the Forum.
Six sessions of the ArabCOF and three sessions of the GCC-COF were held during 2017 and 2020.
The seventh session of the ArabCOF and the fourth session of the GCC-COF were held virtually on 1 and 3 June 2021 with representatives from various Arab meteorological offices and partners. Presentations were delivered on current and anticipated conditions in the Pacific and the Indian Ocean, as well as on climate monitoring and assessment of the current state of climate. Participants also discussed the verification of previous ArabCOF climate outlooks and preparation of the upcoming seasonal forecasts for the entire Arab region. Pursuant to the meeting, consensus seasonal forecast statements for the different sub-regions (ArabCOF, GCCCOF, PRESANORD) were issued for June to August 2021 season.
Amman, Jordan
