Mr Ben Dieterink,

Distinguished Members of the Association of Hydrometeorological Equipment Industry,

I am very pleased to be here today to address your Association. I would like to congratulate you all on the successful establishment of the Association of Hydrometeorological Equipment Industry (HMEI), which was constituted on the occasion of the Annual Meeting of the European Meteorological Society (EMS) in Budapest, Hungary, in September 2001. I understand that the legal instruments will be deposited soon.

This is a culmination of a long-standing aspiration of both instrument and equipment manufacturers and the WMO. I am very happy that the joint co-ordination efforts have come to a very positive conclusion. You may recall that following the request by the Thirteenth WMO Congress, and through active promotion of the WMO Secretariat, several activities were pursued to strengthen the collaboration between the private instrument industry and WMO. Our mutual discussions held at previous Conferences of the American Meteorological Society, WMO meetings, and other occasions lead to today's success. I am particularly very happy that WMO was part of this co-ordination effort.

Meteorological and hydrological instruments are very important elements within several programmes of WMO. In addition to the well-known Global Observation System of the World Weather Watch, and the Global Climate Observing Systems, many new fields and applications for instruments have emerged in recent years. Just to mention a few examples such as urban meteorology, air chemistry studies, air quality monitoring, oceanographic monitoring programmes, long-term measurement campaigns in the polar regions, and monitoring environmental parameters in connection with storage of goods and industrial production processes. The long-term accuracy and stability of measurements for climatological studies is another important aspect.

WMO is at the forefront in developing and setting standards and defining methods of observations in all these application areas. I truly believe that a close co-operation between WMO and the industry will be beneficial for both communities. Not only will you learn early of WMO plans and intentions, WMO will also benefit from views and advice the industry has to offer. It is very important, for instance, that WMO experts are made aware of potential engineering or cost implications a newly conceived observing methodology might have on the instrumentation.

I hope the Association will soon apply for the so-called consultative status with WMO, so that the next session of the Executive Council in June 2002 may already consider the matter. If granted, as we expect, you will be invited to designate your representatives as observers to important WMO events that are of specific interest to you. For example, in the second half of this year, WMO has planned to hold, in addition to the session of the Executive Council, in June, the sessions of the Regional Association for Africa and the sessions of CIMO, of the Commission for Aeronautical Meteorology, the Commission for Agrometeorology, and of the Commission for Basic Systems.

As you may already know, WMO will also organise a technical conference and exhibition related to meteorological and environmental instruments and measurement methods, TECO-2002 and METEOREX-2002 in Bratislava, Slovakia, from 23-25 September 2002. I believe this will be another ideal opportunity for many instrument manufacturers and this Association to further consolidate our co-operation. I would like to take this opportunity to invite you all to participate in the events.

I would like once again to congratulate you and assure you of WMO's continuous collaboration. I wish you a successful continuation of your deliberations here in Orlando.

Thank you for your attention.