Research Seed Grant | 2007-2008
Addressing Vulnerability to Drought Using Forecasts: Innovations in Both Technical and Local Communication
by Lisa Goddard (IRI)
This project combines expertise in climate forecasting, risk communication, and both economic and anthropological research methods to study the gains from improvements in communicating cutting-edge El Nino/La Nina-based forecasts. The research will occur within the state of Ceara, in Brazil's semi-arid Northeast, and concerns a very large and highly vulnerable population in rainfed agriculture, although our examination of communication will also be more widely applicable. Specifically, starting with the very latest rainfall and corn-yield forecasts jointly produced by the IRI and FUNCEME (Ceara's meteorological agency), for each forecast type, the investigators will apply different approaches to communication for different randomly chosen subsets of target audiences and then both qualitatively and quantitatively assess what each conveys and to what effect.
