World Bank releases first tranche of loan for PMD upgrade

$50m project aims at digitisation of observatories, and other facilities

ISLAMABAD:

The World Bank has released the first tranche of its $50 million loan for the restructuring and upgradation of the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) aimed at enabling the department to cater to the training needs of its counterparts in the region.

The project titled ‘Modernization of Hydromet Services of PMD in Pakistan’ will use the World bank loan to digitise the department, and upgrade its observatories from the current manual network to automatic system.

Under the project, according to sources, 300 automatic weather stations and five bigger radars will be installed in the country. Besides for the first time, three mobile weather radars and supercomputers will also be provided to the PMD.

The sources said that the PMD would also be made self-sufficient in terms of acquiring equipment with the help of the World Bank. For this purpose, the PMD workshop will be modernised with staff training on modern lines.

The aim of the digitisation is to enable the PMD to provide training to its counterparts in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and other countries. The sources said that many Gulf countries had contacted Pakistan for the training of their personnel.

They added that agreements had been reached with Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan for this training purpose. With the release of the first instalment of the loan, work on PMD modernisation project had already begun, the sources said.