 Welcome to the World Ready Communication Conference 2023, WRC-23 being held here in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, where I've got the great pleasure of being joined in the studio today by Natalia de Noho, who is the head of the World Meteorological Organization's Space Systems and Utilization Division. Natalia, welcome to the studio. Hello, and thank you so much for having me. I'm excited. This is my first WRC, so I'm really happy to be here representing meteorological and climate community. So thank you for having me. Now, I'd like to start off by asking you, why is it important for WMO to be participating here at the World Ready Communication Conference? WMO is through its hydrological and meteorological services and also through the space agencies, collect Earth's observations and the wide range of essential services to observe water, climate and related environmental issues. And of course, information gathered through these observations is important, is vitally important for the global community, specifically for the insurance safety and property protection. And observing networks also important for WMO integrated global observing system, which is critically dependent on radio frequencies. So I'm hoping that national administrations here continue to recognize that use of spectrum of observation application have a considerable societal and economical value. We urge administrations to take into account the protection of Earth's observing system and specific frequency band because those are important and vital for protecting life and property. I'm hoping they will continue to recognize the spectrum bands for Earth's observing systems, including space and surface-based observations. Now, collaboration between WMO and ITU is very significant when it comes to weather and climate observation. Perhaps I can ask you to elaborate on how the two organizations work together. Well, WMO and ITU have a long-time standing collaboration. In fact, we like sister organizations in terms of the meteorological data and digital technologies. But I also think it's important to note that ITU is our partner in early warning for all initiative. And I think we will be working real closely for the next few years on this important initiative that is spearheaded by UN Secretary Gutierrez. So we're really looking forward working with ITU even more. Now, let's talk about spectrum. Spectrum is one of the key topics of conversation here at the World Radio Communication Conference. A lot of decisions being made about spectrum. What specific spectrum issues is WMO particularly concerned about? And how will they affect the work of WMO in the future? So we have several issues here, but the most important ones are advocating and protection of portions of the spectrum, which are critical for observations, in particular sea surface temperature and microwave observations from space. And also the introduction of a topic of space weather which would allow in the future in 2027 plus to argue for protection of frequency critical for these observations. As you know, some people don't recognize about certain events in space weather, but if we're talking about billion-dollar disasters, this could become something even bigger if an event happened in the future and could wipe out a lot of technology and satellites and things like that. But also sea surface temperature, you know, it's important for forecasting of hurricanes in the Caribbean, for example, so we're really hoping that those frequency will be protected. And finally, the UN Climate Conference COP28 is also taking place here in Dubai. Its work starts tomorrow. I wanted to ask you what is the role of Earth observation technologies, such as satellites and remote sensing in monitoring climate change? The Earth's observations, of course, are important for monitoring climate change and disasters and verification of predictions. And I think because the observations are collected around the globe and the involvement of the international community with this policymaking specifically, it's important to understand the value of specifically space-based observations in the monitoring climate change environment. I'm really happy that events are happening in the same country in parallel almost so we can actually have discussions with people who attend in both events, for example, so it's real convenient. Not just that, but administrations and specific policy makers as well. Well, Natalia, thank you so much for joining us in the studio and we look forward to catching up with you again very soon. Thank you for having me. Thank you. And if you've enjoyed this interview, why not check out our other interviews on the ITU YouTube channel as well as our podcast on SoundCloud, Spotify, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And for further information, why not visit our website at www.itu.int. Thanks for tuning in.