LAGAWE, Ifugao, Philippines – People in this municipality are now better prepared in times of calamities following the installation of an early warning device by the government’s weather bureau in order to ensure the provision of accurate warnings to the people on the status of the weather prevailing in the province.

An automatic weather station (AWS) constructed by the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Service Administration (PAG-ASA) was formally opened recently to cater to the needs of the community especially farmers and other agriculture and tourism stakeholders for them to be aware of the prevailing weather situation in their places and for them to be guided accordingly on what to do.

The establishment of the PAGASA-AWS at the Ifugao State University (IFSU) Lagawe campus is a project under the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) funded by the Spanish government in coordination with the university administration.

Dr. Vicente Malano, PAGASA’s acting Deputy Administrator for Operations and Services, said the AWS is a part of strengthening the capacity of their office to provide timely and accurate forecast warning to the people, especially during the onslaught of heavy rains and typhoons during the La Nina phenomenon.

“The MDG project has set up a series of AWS in four project sites namely Lagawe, Albay, Sorsogon and Butuan to provide a platform for real-time data communication to the PAG-ASA forecast centers.