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Antonio Cocco Quezada stresses the importance of creating the Climatic Resources Sub-secretary to adapt the country to climate change.
The president of CODIA’s Disasters chapter was the first one to intervene in the debate session last Thursday at the “Second conference on Climate Change: Evidence of global warming in the Dominican Republic”
Santo Domingo, August 23, 2007

Last Thursday Antonio Cocco Quezada, president of the Disasters chapter at the “Colegio Dominicano de Ingenieros y Agrimensores” (CODIA), took up again his proposal to create the Climatic Resources Sub-secretary and strengthen the meteorological services raising the National Office level to Institute level. “This will allow the State to give the due attention to country’s arrangements to adapt to the expected climate change. In addition, to take advantage of the climatic resources it counts on”.

Cocco spoke in those terms in the first presentation of the debate at the “Second conference on Climate Change: Evidence of global warming in the Dominican Republic”, which takes place at FUNGLODE.

In his conference titled “The Dominican Republic’s Climatology: relevance for a sustainable future”, Cocco stated that in order to be able to carry out all the activities that lead to a change in attitude and mitigation efforts, “we have to reorganize ourselves, rescue climatologic information and apply quality controls, improve the observation stations, make information available to the public, stimulate research, integrate universities in climate research, explore the climatologic resources and project our development based on climate”.

According to him, the sub-secretary he proposes “will allow us to a meet the Dominican Republic’s immediate challenges: monitoring global warming, preparing the country for the impact of global climate change, conserve and manage adequately water resources, assure greater efficiency  in the attention to natural disasters, food production based on climate, take advantage of energy climatologic resources and poverty reduction”.

Antonio Cocco presented a historic overview, from the times of the tainos until our days in reference to climate observation and the establishment of forecasts and behaviors. “After several experiences such as those of the tainos, Charlevoix, the world climate regulating centers, the frequency of hydro meteorological disasters, the results of climate change and the need for sustainable development, we need a climate model that answers to all these experiences that have been accumulated throughout the centuries.  In addition, said model also has to respond to the variations that occurred in a given period of time and in the same region or in different regions due to the factors that influenced climate at the time.”

The Dominican Republic’s Climate

As the result of his studies on climate classifications, the engineer concluded that none of the existing classifications “related the climatic behavior to the dynamic elements that model our climate such as the atmosphere’s general circulation systems, the semi permanent anticyclones, the migratory cyclones, the secondary circulations and the local influence along with all the other factors that we outlined at the beginning of this conference.”

Thus, Cocco considered that the Spanish Island “is under the influence of the North Atlantic cyclone, which regulates the trade wind and the humid tropical maritime air. When this air is disrupted by the eastern waves of the summer, it becomes the cause of a great part of the precipitations.” In addition, according to his conclusions, the winter meteorological systems, also called fronts and watercourses that come along with the maritime air, “are also responsible for important precipitations during that time of the year.”

Thus, he has developed a classification composed of three periods. The first one is the connective activity period that lasts three months from May until July; the second period is of tropical activity and spans from August until October, and the third one is the frontal activity period from November until April. “There are two short transition periods: one goes from frontal activity to connective activity in the second half of April where we pass from an atmosphere with subtropical characteristics, to tropical characteristics; the second transition period takes place in the first half of the month of November and it goes from tropical to frontal activity going inversely from a tropical atmosphere to a subtropical one.”

Analyzing climate this way, it’s easier to understand, Cocco said, the reason for rain in the North Atlantic coastal flat lands during the winter, the reason for rain in the south during the summer and the reason for seasonal draughts. “With this methodology, we understand the different behaviors of the Tavera and Valdesia reservoirs, the fact that Puerto Plata receives great precipitations in the months of November, December and January caused by the frontal systems that come from the U.S. In the south, the station located at the Americas International Airport presents the highest values during August, September and October. This three-month period coincides the tropical activity period. In the mean time, May is the month of maximum precipitation in the connective activity period in the interior of the country. Furthermore, we can plan the agricultural year in the diverse production macro systems.”

Relevance for a Sustainable Future

Cocco concluded his intervention addressing the issue of “sustainable development.” The expert argues that nature has favored the Dominican Republic with a climate that promotes its development. “Yet, it leaves the responsibility of exploiting adequately. To make possible the sustainable development needed by the nation, we can’t tolerate the disappearance of rivers or violence against the mountains.”

He also assured that the country has abundant water, yet poverty is linked to its shortage. “There is something that we aren’t getting and that could be the inadequate management of extreme climatic conditions where factors such as meteorological draughts, so common in our country, intervene. This can be proved by the rural migrations that have been taking place in the last decades.”

For these reasons, for Antonio Cocco Quezada, the solution is to include climate as a fundamental element in the nation’s development. Hence, through a Climate economy, or Econoclimatology, the economic aspects of production can be managed. We would have to do it considering the two “assets” that climate offers: the wealth-generating beneficial forces and the harmful forces that cause death and destruction.”

Regarding the beneficial forces, the engineer said that we should take the greatest advantage of optimal environmental conditions such as radiation, the strength of the wind, temperature and humidity, among others. About the harmful forces, he stated that “in order to really undertake the road towards development, it is necessary to substantially improve our risk management skills. In this way, climatologic disasters won’t destroy our plan of leaving future generations a country capable of offering the wellbeing we enjoyed. The developed countries did it and have been economically successful.”

Based on international experts’ opinions, such as a western economist who states that the return  per every dollar invested in climatologic and meteorological formation is 98 dollars, or Chinese researchers who assured that for every Yuan invested in this sector, Chinese businesses could earn 40 Yuan, “which is somehow profitable”; Cocco asked” “What are we waiting for?”

To the eyes of the engineer, the Dominican Republic’s climate exploitation is in its “early stages.” We should not continue building a hospital or a school without analyzing the climatic and environmental conditions. Roads and other engineering work in the environment can double or triple its costs when done in rainy seasons. Likewise, houses should have adequate ventilation base don predominant air circulation in every city.”

The last words in his intervention were clear and concise. “Ladies and Gentleman, we can’t say we have the best climate in the World, but we are close to it. Let’s take advantage, love and protect our climate, and let’s leave it with all the beneficial forces intact for future Dominican generations.”

See his presentation "The Dominican Republic’s Climatology: relevance for a sustainable future"

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