China's AI weather agent being deployed globally

The global rollout of the AI agent for urban hazard warning is managed by the Zhang Qian Mission, an international cooperation unit formed in 2024 by the Shanghai Meteorological Service. Composed of roughly 50 young scientists and engineers, the group coordinates system delivery, installation and technical training.

The mission has established distinct, localized pipelines to handle unique geographic challenges across Asia and Africa, customizing the AI's predictive models to the specific climate threats faced by partner nations.

In Mongolia, where authorities face severe desertification, flash floods and "dzuds" — extreme winter freezes that cause catastrophic livestock mortality — the system was officially transferred in July 2025. The tool is currently being calibrated to track regional forage availability and broadcast high-priority alerts to nomadic herders, a measure aimed directly at stabilizing the country's livestock-dependent economy.

Meanwhile, the framework is being adapted in Nigeria to address severe riverine flooding and coastal high-tide inundation. Local teams are currently piloting the cloud-based infrastructure, with an operational focus on incorporating predictive flood modeling to protect vulnerable river ecosystems and facilitate early evacuations.

A similar deployment was finalized in Djibouti in late 2025. Because the East African nation faces a volatile mix of extreme arid cycles and sudden flash flooding, engineers are focusing updates on maximizing the geographic accuracy of the system to ensure rapid, neighborhood-level alerts for urban centers.

The Zhang Qian Mission takes its name from Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 220) explorer and envoy Zhang Qian (c.164-114 BC), whose expeditions and diplomatic missions paved the way for the Silk Road.

"A big highlight of our AI agent is that it is placed locally with interfaces prepared for users. They can upload their local data to the system, which we are not able to see on the backend," said Xu Chen, a member of the Shanghai Meteorological Service's specialized international outreach team. "They can also use the tools in the system to analyze the data, and the whole process is totally safe on its own."

Joining the mission in 2024, Xu has worked closely with the meteorological team in Nigeria.

"It is very fulfilling when we see that our technology and experience can actually help the people in other countries. Our overseas counterparts may not summarize their philosophy (of meteorological service) as 'people-centered' as we do, but we do share the same goal," said Xu.