WMO
World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
Within the United Nations, the Geneva-based 185-Member
Organization provides the authoritative scientific voice on
the state and behavior of the Earth's atmosphere and climate.
The purposes of WMO are to facilitate international cooperation in the establishment of networks of stations for making meteorological, hydrological and other observations; and to promote the rapid exchange of meteorological information, the standardization of meteorological observations and the uniform publication of observations and statistics.
The WMO code form FM 94 BUFR (Binary Universal Form for the Representation of meteorological data) is a binary code designed to represent, employing a continuous binary
stream, any meteorological data. The WMO code form FM 92-VIII Ext. GRIB (GRIdded Binary) is a general purpose, bit-oriented data exchange format designed as an efficient vehicle for transmitting and storing large volumes of gridded data. Both incorporate standard mechanisms to define data categories (Table A) and classifications of elements (Table B).
These are documented in the WMO Manual on Codes (Publication No. 306) - Volume I.1 Part A: Alphanumeric codes; Volume I.2 Part B: Binary codes and Part C: Common features to binary and alphanumeric codes; Volume II: Regional codes and national coding practices.