Saving paradise: ensuring sustainable development

As an outcome of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the 1994 Barbados Conference on the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States not only recognized common environmental challenges facing SIDS, but also highlighted the meteorological, hydrological and oceanographic issues in many of these countries. The Barbados Programme of Action (BPoA), the principal output of the Conference, identified 14 issues and/or focal areas as urgent priorities. All these areas require inputs of varying degree from the National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs) of SIDS and the global network of the NMHSs under the aegis of WMO.