Somalia’s Trusted Data Systems Turn Early Warnings Into Lifesaving Action

Maxwell Sibhensana, Deputy Director of FAO’s Office of Emergency and Resilience, told participants that resilience programmes depend on the strength of the evidence behind them.

Somalia's experience with droughts, floods, food insecurity and displacement has produced two powerful information systems that help decision-makers act before danger grows into a full-scale crisis. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations showcased the FSNAU Early Warning–Early Action Dashboard and the Somalia Water and Land Information Management programme, known as SWALIM, during its Regional Office for Africa Resilience Community of Practice sessions.

African countries have invested heavily in food security assessments, climate monitoring and early warning tools, yet useful information does not always lead to fast, coordinated or properly funded responses. Somalia's model shows how trusted evidence, clear warning signals and agreed financing arrangements can connect data directly with action.

Maxwell Sibhensana, Deputy Director of FAO's Office of Emergency and Resilience, told participants that resilience programmes depend on the strength of the evidence behind them. With 266 million people experiencing acute food insecurity worldwide, country offices need to use evidence while designing interventions and measure whether those actions are making a real difference.

One Dashboard Turns Complex Evidence Into Clear Local Warnings

Created under a 2015 mandate from the Somalia Humanitarian Country Team and launched in 2016, the FSNAU dashboard brings fragmented information into one shared system that humanitarian agencies, government institutions and development partners can understand and use.

The platform consolidates 22 indicators covering climate, markets, health, nutrition, displacement and insecurity. Its information comes from organizations and systems including SWALIM, the Famine Early Warning Systems Network, the United States Geological Survey, the World Health Organization, UNICEF, UNHCR, health and nutrition clusters, and ACLED.

Rather than generating all the information itself, FSNAU serves as its technical custodian, checking and combining evidence before translating it into three straightforward district-level signals: Normal, Alert and Alarm. Monthly updates allow partners to see where conditions are worsening and focus assistance on communities facing the greatest danger.

The dashboard demonstrated its value in late 2025 when its warnings helped activate Somalia's Food Security Crisis Preparedness Plan. More than USD 100 million in response financing was mobilized, including USD 50 million from the World Bank, showing that an early warning system becomes truly useful when it is connected to decisions, funding and action.

"Early warning only has value if it leads to early action," said Verenica Mutiro, Head of Programme for FAO Somalia.

Water and Climate Monitoring Helps Communities Escape Disaster

SWALIM supplies much of the environmental evidence supporting Somalia's preparedness work. Over nearly 25 years, the programme has rebuilt the country's hydro-meteorological monitoring network through weather stations, river gauges and groundwater monitoring systems, giving authorities and humanitarian partners a clearer view of emerging threats.

Its influence was visible during the 2023 El Niño floods. More than 260,000 early warning messages supported the evacuation of 90 percent of people at risk in Beledweyne. Analysis also linked SWALIM warnings with a 43 percent reduction in flooded agricultural land during major flood years, protecting crops, household incomes and rural livelihoods.

The programme's geospatial specialists use very-high-resolution satellite imagery to examine environmental activity across difficult-to-reach areas. Their work has documented charcoal production and stockpiling in southern Somalia, providing independently verifiable evidence used by the United Nations Security Council to monitor the country's charcoal-export ban.

Satellite and land analysis has also identified suitable growing conditions for at least 14 crops, giving government agencies and investors practical guidance for agricultural planning and land use.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs considers FSNAU and SWALIM Somalia's two most trusted data sources. Their credibility helped Somalia become the first country to pilot anticipatory action financing, where pre-agreed warning triggers release money before an expected El Niño event causes widespread harm.

Local Keeps Information Working Beyond Each Emergency

FAO Somalia is gradually transferring SWALIM responsibilities to national institutions while establishing information management centres in Puntland and Somaliland. Somali technicians are being mentored through real operational assignments, building the practical skills needed to collect, interpret and apply environmental information without permanent dependence on outside expertise.

The Resilience Community of Practice was launched in June 2025 to help FAO teams share successful approaches across Africa. Countries are not expected to reproduce Somalia's systems exactly. Each government can begin by mapping its existing information sources, identifying gaps, agreeing on shared standards and creating a system that delivers clear evidence to the people authorized to act.

Somalia's experience carries a direct lesson for the wider continent: resilience becomes stronger when reliable information reaches decision-makers early enough to protect communities, livelihoods and public resources before a warning turns into a crisis.