The 79th meeting of the EUMETSAT Council took place in Darmstadt, Germany, on 26 November.

Bulgaria is on its way to becoming a EUMETSAT Member State in 2014 following the signature of the accession agreement by EUMETSAT Director-General Alain Ratier and Prof Dr Aneliya Klisarova, Minister of Education and Science of Bulgaria, during the session of the 79th Council meeting.

Following the 27th Plenary of the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS) in Montreal, Canada, on 5-6 November 2013, EUMETSAT has taken over the CEOS chairmanship for the coming year.

The European Space Policy Institute (ESPI) has released a study demonstrating clear and measurable benefits resulting from the long-standing partnership between EUMETSAT and the United States’ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) - for both organisations, their user communities and the stakeholders that provide the funding.

On 16-20 September 2013, meteorological experts, scientists and researchers will meet in Vienna, Austria, for the joint 2013 EUMETSAT Meteorological Satellite Conference and the 19th American Meteorological Society (AMS) Satellite Meteorology, Oceanography and Climatology Conference.

Iceland is on its way to becoming a EUMETSAT Member State in 2014 following the signature of the accession agreement by EUMETSAT Director-General Alain Ratier and Sigurður Ingi Jóhannsson, Minister for Environment and Natural Resources of Iceland on 30 August.

EUMETSAT has increased the bandwidth of the communications link between Svalbard, Norway, and its headquarters in Darmstadt, Germany.