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Page 1: Global July 09

JULY 2009 VOL 13 ISSUE 7

AFRICA I AMERICAS I ASIA I AUSTRALIA I EUROPE www.GISdevelopment.net

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11Price: INR 150 / US$ 15 Subscriber’s copy. Not for Sale

Page 2: Global July 09
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With ArcGIS®, you can create applications that meet today’s high expectations for Web

mapping. By making your authoritative data available to people both inside and outside

your organization via fast, effective Web maps, you give them the spatial intelligence

they need to make decisions. To learn how ArcGIS 9.3.1 can help you deploy modern

Web maps that are relevant to your entire enterprise, visit www.esri.com/whatsnew.

ArcGIS® 9.3.1Use Fast, Intuitive Web Maps to Share Your Geographic Knowledge

Users can easily access and leverage your GIS with clients built on

Flex | Silverlight | JavaScript | ArcGIS Explorer

Copyright © 2009 ESRI. All rights reserved. The ESRI globe logo, ESRI, ArcGIS, and www.esri.com are trademarks, registered trademarks, or service marks of ESRI in the United States, the European Community, or certain other jurisdictions. Other companies and products mentioned herein may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective trademark owners.

G35469_P_GIS-Development_May09.indd 1 3/23/09 1:13:11 PM

Page 5: Global July 09

July 2009

Of road blocks and building blocks

Uptake of GI in Africa requires concerted efforts to provide enabling environment toensure that geospatial info permeates every aspect of society

Dr Olajide Kufoniyi

Mapping Africa for Africa

Lack of political will, financial capability and skilled manpower - African nations arebattling out all odds to unite geodetically...

Dr Derek Clarke

Together as one

The Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD) is an inter-governmental organisation established under the auspices of UN Economic Commission of Africa (ECA) and the African Union...

ESRI W

Training to combat

In 2003, the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) was launched to combat global HIV/AIDS - the largest commitment by any nation to combat a singledisease in history

Dorina Maris

GIS DEVELOPMENT 5

W h a t ’ s i n s i d e

28

18

34

38

52 First Person

Dr Derek ClarkeChief Director: Surveys and Mapping

Department of Rural Development and

Land Reform, South Africa

Regular Features

07 Editorial I 08 News I 58 Events

35

'Uptake of

spatial tech is slow

but promising'

I expect rapidchanges becausemapping is one discipline that isbeing transformedby technology very fast

- Dr Hussein O. Farah

Director General, Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for

Development (RCMRD), Kenya

Articles

ABOUT COVER

Volumes have been written on Africa -home of Homo Sapiens, the land of abillion people. Though colonial legacieshave put Africa on backburner for cen-turies, the continent is galloping todevelopment today adopting latestgeospatial technologies. Regional imbal-ances not withstanding, the clarion call– Africa Unite - is threading countriesgeospatially together.

Page 6: Global July 09

July 2009GIS DEVELOPMENT6

ADVISORY BOARD

Dato’ Dr. Abdul Kadir bin TaibDeputy Director General of Survey and Mapping, Malaysia

Bhupinder SinghSr. Vice PresidentBentley Systems Inc.

Prof. Ian Dowman PresidentISPRS

Prof. Josef Strobl Director, Centre for GeoinformaticsUniversity of Salzburg, Austria

Kamal K Singh Chairman and CEORolta Group of Companies

Mark Reichardt President and CEO,Open Geospatial Consortium

Matthew O’Connell CEO, GeoEyeSDKFDS

Dr. Prithvish Nag DirectorNATMO, India

Prof. V. S RamamurthyChairmanIIT, Delhi, India

KCM KumarChairman & Managing DirectorSpeck Systems Limited

Brian NichollsGeneral ManagerAAMHatch

Shailesh Nayak SecretaryMinistry of Earth Sciences, India

Prof William CartwrightPresidentInternational Cartographic Association

Dr Derek. G. ClarkeChief Director: Surveys and MappingSouth Africa

Bradley C SkeltonChief Technology OfficerERDAS

PRESIDENT M P Narayanan Editor-in-Chief Ravi Gupta Director Maneesh Prasad Publisher Sanjay Kumar

PUBLICTIONS TEAM Managing Editor (Honorary) Prof. Arup Dasgupta Sr. Associate Editor (Honorary)

Dr. Hrishikesh Samant Associate Editor Bhanu Rekha Sub Editors Simmi Sinha,

Pratiksha Singh Product Manager Shivani Lal

DESIGN TEAM Sr. Creative Designer Deepak Kumar Graphic Designer Manoj Kumar Singh

CIRCULATION TEAM Vijay Kumar Singh

GIS Development Pvt. Ltd. A - 145, Sector - 63, Noida, India Tel + 91 - 120 - 4612500 Fax + 91 - 120 - 4612555 / 666

Collaborate to reach out

HIV/AIDS is unfortunately a major public health concern in many countries inAfrica. Making sure that people in need of HIV/AIDS care get access to treatmentin an equitable way requires taking several parameters into account, making plan-ning decisions sometimes difficult.

Ebener Steeve

SA - On a growth path with GIS

South Africa has always been more progressive than other African countries interms of use of ICT. In 1980s, South Africa was characterised by a general lackof awareness in national and provincial governmental departments regarding whatspatial data was available as well as what capabilities GIS offered in practice.

Anamika DasRI Writer, USA

42

46

22 Surveyor General Speak

A key challenge for the geoinfor-mation communityin Africa is theneed for closerlinkage betweenthe geoinformationproducts and societal benefits

DISCLAIMERGIS Development does not necessarily subscribe to the views expressed in the publication. Allviews expressed in this issue are those of the contributors. It is not responsible for any loss to any-one due to the information provided.

GIS Development Pvt. Ltd. Printed and Published by Sanjay Kumar. Press M. P. Printers B-220,Phase-II, Noida, Gautambudh Nagar (UP) INDIA Publication Address P-82, Sector-11, Gautambudh Nagar, Noida, India Editor Ravi Gupta

26

One for the road

While one is struggling with manual techniques of surveying,the other uses a vast array of latest technologies. While onefights the lack of political will and financial capability, hisneighbour is totally motivated. While one is opening eyes tothe idea of SDI, the other is far ahead in the race. Yet, theyare all together - discussing the issues, building bridges, shar-ing experiences and expertise. Bhanu Rekha spoke to theSurveyor Generals of African nations to know the status ofgeoinformation, challenges and opportunities in their respec-tive countries.

Aida Opoku-MensahDirector - ICTs and S&T Division (ISTD) UN

Economic Commission for Africa

Interview

Page 7: Global July 09

GIS DEVELOPMENT 7

Africa always excites imagination. Rolling

veld, equatorial forests, deserts, massive

waterfalls; it presents nature in all its

wild beauty. It also has problems of drought and

erosion of natural wealth, of human conflict, of

human competition with animals for habitat, or

reckless exploitation of natural resources. It is

thus an immediate candidate for meticulous

inventory and informed management of the frag-

ile environment. In short, Africa is very fertile

ground for geospatial technology applications.

In this issue, we showcase Africa and its tryst

with geospatial technology and applications in

various spheres. Mapping is the starting point

and some of the key efforts like the Committee

on Development Information, CODI which has

now become CODIST, or the Committee on

Development Information, Science and Technol-

ogy under the UN Economic Commission for Africa are covered. The main problem

is of continent wide standardisation and a beginning has been made with the African

Geodetic Reference framework, AFREF. The issues, as always, are more political and

financial than technical. Different security regimes in different countries hinder

exchange of data and information. Access to data varies from nation to nation. In this

milieu, it is heartening to note the efforts being put in by various agencies and cham-

pions of change. We carry interviews from some of these leaders.

The world is interested in Africa. Europe has started an Africa Initiative. USAID

among other efforts is looking at the spatial dimensions of the HIV-AIDS problem.

Bodies like the World Health Organisation, WHO, Global Spatial Data Infrastruc-

ture, GSDI and International Cartographic Association, ICA are also playing their

part by providing platforms where global knowledge and expertise can be shared and

brought to bear on many of the problems.

On its part, GIS Development made a very modest beginning three years ago with

the first Map Africa held in Johannesburg in 2006. Two more events followed, this

time in Cape Town and in 2009 we return to Johannesburg for the 2009 event. This

issue is an attempt to put the African geospatial scenario in perspective. We hope

that the articles and interviews will set the ball rolling leading to meaningful discus-

sions during Map Africa 2009.

Prof. Arup Dasgupta

Managing Editor (Honorary) [email protected]

A fertile ground for geospatia

l applicatio

ns

A fertile ground for geospatia

l applicatio

ns

E d i t o r S p e a k

Jaly 2009

Page 8: Global July 09

News

GIS DEVELOPMENT8

Deconstructing Asia’s largest slum

For the first time in the country, GIS

has been used to map each and every

structure and household in the 590-

acre Mumbai’s slum Dharavi. As part of

the Rs 15,000 crore Dharavi Redevel-

opment Project, a survey was carried

out by Pune-based NGO Mashal.

According to the survey, which is still

in the process, there are 60,158 struc-

tures in Dharavi of which 45,563 tenements are residential in the five sec-

tors that have been demarcated for redevelopment. The survey has found

that there are at least 50 industrial units, have a monthly turnover of Rs

one crore each and that the average family income here is between Rs

13,000 and Rs 15,000 a month. The GIS-based biometric and socio-economic

baseline survey will allow a user to - at the click of a button - narrow down

on a particular structure and get information about its occupant.

CSIR installs new

X-band antenna

An invest-

ment of R 22

million by the

CSIR in a

state-of-the-

art X-band

antenna has

bolstered the

capacity of its

Satellite

Applications

Centre to track more earth observa-

tion satellites and increase its archive

of earth observation data. The capa-

bilities of the X-band antenna will

boost the CSIR’s data democracy

project as well as government-funded

initiatives, such as the Department of

Science and Technology-funded

South African Earth Observation

Strategy, and the delivery of SPOT 5

data to all government stakeholders

on a yearly basis.

NLC to harmonise

GIS data

The National Land Centre (NLC),

the land regulatory body of Rwanda, is

set to harmonise all GIS data. This is

in a bid to streamline access, ease in

sharing and reference amongst all its

users. This was revealed during a

meeting NLC had with all the users of

GIS technology at its headquarters in

Gishushu. NLC hopes that proce-

Africa dures and priorities can be adapted to

guide and simplify spatial data shar-

ing among all the users.

Governor calls for

property mapping

Lagos State Governor, Babatunde

Fashola (SAN) asserted that the gov-

ernment is poised to ensure that it

captures all lands in the State into a

GIS in order to bring prosperity to the

people and the power of the Lagos

economy depends on to what extent

land can be turned into an instrument

of prosperity. Governor Fashola added

that most people often lament about

their inability to secure collaterals for

bank facilities without realising that

the personal houses and buildings

which were bequeathed to them or

which they own can become useful

collaterals once the titles are perfect-

ed and such properties will become

useful documents which are tenable

before banks with the new GIS map-

ping system.

Oil slick mapping

project complete

Infoterra Ltd has completed an oil

slick mapping and interpretation proj-

ect of offshore Seychelles in collabo-

ration with Seychelles Petroleum

Company (Seypec). This is the largest

slick mapping project ever undertaken

offshore Seychelles - with the acquisi-

tion of over 150 radar satellite scenes

across the 500,000 sq km area - the

project was undertaken during April

and May to take advantage of the

optimum weather window.

July 2009

Asia

Page 9: Global July 09

GIS DEVELOPMENT 9

Prithiviraj Chavan is new S&T minister

Prithviraj Chavan is the new Minis-

ter of Science and Technology and

Earth Sciences in the newly elect-

ed UPA government. He succeeds

Kapil Sibal to the post. Chavan has

done his BE (Honours) from BITS,

Pilani (Rajasthan) and MS from Uni-

versity of California, Berkeley. Cha-

van, a close adviser to Prime minis-

ter had spent time working in the

field of aircraft instrumentation

and designing audio recorders for

anti-submarine warfare in the US before returning to India. He is also a member of the

Atomic Energy Commission and the Space Commission, the highest policy making bodies

in their respective fields. He was part of the prime ministerial delegation to the United

States in July 2005 when the Indo-US nuclear deal was negotiated. On the first day in

office at CSIR, Chavan held a meeting with heads of departments and key officials of

the two ministries following a warm welcome by the scientists, researchers and offi-

cials. The team of scientists and CSIR Director General Samir Brahmachari appraised

the minister with the ongoing projects in various science and technology areas. Making

his first move as the minister, he promised that the Right to Information Act (RTI)

will be imroved in India. The minister said he is looking forward to all science and

technology departments to work synergistically.

ERDAS, DG to

educate end users

Digital Globe & ERDAS joined hands

to educate and cater to the needs of

geospatial users in terms of data

through a series of seminars across the

country. The first seminar in the

series is organised in Patna. The semi-

nar showcased Digital Globe, with its

imagery solutions, and ERDAS, with

its tools like LPS and Apollo server.

About 30 people from various govern-

ment organisations like Flood Man-

agement Information System Cell,

Survey of India etc attended the sem-

inar. Achyut Rao, Regional Sales Man-

ager, Digital Globe, briefed about the

products they offer and their techni-

cal specifications. Atanu Sinha &

Mahesh Reddy from ERDAS focussed

on Creating Stereo Imaginary by

geospatial solutions.

IIT’s low-cost GIS

software

Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)

Mumbai has developed a low-cost

GIS software which can be used for

resource management by community

development programmes, govern-

ment sectors, NGOs and industries.

The software will be distributed in the

market by Bhugol GIS Pvt Ltd . The

low cost software is a GIS planning

tool and is tailor-made for users with

wide range of operations such as map

database creation, query and retrieval,

analysis and visualisation.

Car navigation in

its early stage

ResearchInChina, the vertical portal

for Chinese business intelligence,

announced the release of a new

report - China Navigation Map Mar-

ket Report, 2008-2009. The report

said the Chinese car navigation mar-

ket is in its early stage compared to

Japan, Europe and U.S.A. In 2008,

the market penetration rate of car

navigation in China was only 4.56%,

far lower than the 60% of Japan, and

20%-30% of both Europe and USA.

In 2008, the car ownership reached

to 149 million in China, among

which 40 million are private cars

and about 6.8 million cars have

installed navigation devices. Also in

2008, Chinese car navigation market

sharply increased, a total of 3.1

million navigation devices were

sold during the year, more than

doubled of 2007.

July 2009

Page 10: Global July 09

RazakSAT’s new

launch date

RazakSAT, that was supposed to be

launched on April 21 but put off due to

technical reasons, will now be launched on

July 14. The date was set by Space Explo-

ration Technology (SpaceX) which is

responsible for the launch after they had

corrected technical problems which were

excessive vibrations in the rocket launcher,

said Science, Technology and Innovation

Minister Datuk Dr Maximus Ongkili.

RazakSAT will be launched from Kwa-

jalein Atoll, Republic of Marshall Islands.

Mapping cultural

assets of Pakistan

Norway and Pakistan would carry out

mapping of tangible and intangible

cultural assets in north west frontier

province, focussing initially on seven

districts, in collaboration with

UNESCO, according to Robert

Kevile, Norwegian Ambassador. The

project would focus initially on dis-

tricts of Peshawar, Mardan, Mansehra,

Charsadda, Swat, Bannu and Chitral.

Joint space

research with India

Japan and India plan to launch their

first joint space research project this

year, an experiment in growing plants

in zero gravity, said a Japan

Aerospace Exploration Agency

(JAXA) researcher. The two Asian

powers are set to launch a small

and unmanned Indian-made satellite

in October, carrying Japanese labora-

tory equipment, which is set to orbit

for about

one week at

a height of

around 600

kilometers

(370 miles).

Japan

already sends astronauts to the Inter-

national Space Station and has con-

ducted several space experiments in

its Kibo laboratory.

Countdown begins for DubaiSat-1

DubaiSat-1, the first satellite developed by a UAE

entity, will be launched on July 25, marking the

beginning of an era of space technology research.

The remote-sensing satellite, developed by the

Emirates Institution for Advanced Science &

Technology (EIAST) will enable collec-

tion of space and earth observation

data. Images from DubaiSat-1 can be

used for applications such as urban development, sci-

entific research, telecommunications and transportation. DubaiSat-1 is

designed for a minimum lifetime of five years in-orbit operation. The satel-

lite is capable of high-resolution imaging and is in line with internationally

recognised standards. DubaiSat-1 will be launched under the supervision and

with the authorisation of the Russian Federal Space Agency through the

Moscow-based International Space Company Kosmotras.

UAE engineers to design DubaiSat 2

As the UAE's first remote sensing satellite prepares for a summer launch,

engineers in the Emirates are already designing an advanced version which

will provide government agencies with greater help to shape the country's

future. The Emirates Institution for Advanced Science and Technology

(EIAST), said that lessons learnt in DubaiSat-1 development will ensure that

the follow-up project delivers an enhanced quality of data. EIAST techni-

cians who worked alongside South Korean engineers on DubaiSat 1, have tak-

en the lead role in designing Dubai-Sat 2.

GIS DEVELOPMENT10 July 2009

Page 11: Global July 09

Map unmasks

secret places

What can best be described as group

spying has resulted in one of the

world's most complete maps of one of

the world's most secretive countries,

North Korea.

The map, a project of Google Earth,

reveals hundreds of sites rarely if

ever seen by Westerners. Those

include markets, manufacturing

plants, prisons, anti-aircraft locations,

military bases and even the seaside

homes of political leaders. Curtis

Melvin, an economics doctoral stu-

dent at George Mason University

here, began the mapping project in

April 2007.

He used his own photographs taken

on trips to North Korea to pinpoint

their locations on satellite maps.

Soon, people were sharing their own

eyewitness knowledge of the country.

Following clues from drawings and

news stories helped fill in many more

blanks. Now in its 17th version, the

map has been downloaded more than

77,000 times.

It can be downloaded at nkecon-

watch. com/north-korea-uncovered-

google-earth/

Country’s second

satellite in 2012

Vietnam plans to launch its second

satellite in 2012, a local newspaper

The New Hanoi reported. This is an

important plan which was included in

the strategy of research and applica-

tion of space technology to 2020 of

the country. The satellite, called

VNREDSat-1, is of small size and low

orbit. It will be used to monitor and

take picture of the earth surface of

different sizes and types and provide

those pictures to centers gathering

earth-surface satellite pictures. A con-

trolling center will be built on an area

of two hectares in the Hoa Lac High-

Tech Park in Hanoi.

Geographic

Calculator 7.3

Blue Marble Geographics released

Geographic Calculator 7.3 and Geo-

graphic Transformer 6.1 via the Blue

Marble Desktop 2.0, the all-in-one

geospatial data management platform

for Blue Marble’s popular data trans-

formation tools. This release will

introduce the Spatial Connect 7.3

Module for working with a variety of

spatial databases. The release features

an upgrade of the Geographic Calcu-

lator to version 7.3, which now con-

tains added support for ATS, GARS,

and BNG string point data format-

ting. Performance enhancements for

the ESRI / Geographic Calculator

extension, additional XLS read write

support, and a new arbitrary scale and

translation for point database conver-

sion jobs are also featured.

Support for

OpenGeo Suite

OpenGeo, a company in open source

geospatial software development and

support, announced that it will offer

total integrated support packages for

July 2009 GIS DEVELOPMENT

>> Releases

SiRFatlasIV GPS

navigation

processor

SiRF Technolo-

gy has made

available the

new version of

its navigation

processor called SiRFatlasIV. This

ARM11 based GPS application specif-

ic processor is made for designing

mass-volume GPS integrated mobile

systems with location awareness

features at low cost. SiRFatlasIV can

provide 64 channels.

Its multifunction location system

processor employing multi-satellite

system location engine, with more

than 1,000,000 correlators is strong

enough to receive signals in loca-

tions with poor signal reach such as

urban concrete jungles, dense

foliage, and steep ravines. It pro-

vides -161-dBm simultaneous track-

ing of both GPS and Galileo satel-

lites. SiRFatlasIV complements

SiRF's SiRFprima multifunction loca-

tion system processor introduced

last year in building media rich GPS

navigation systems.

11

Page 12: Global July 09

the OpenGeo Suite. The Suite

includes supported versions of the

OpenLayers map component,

GeoServer application server, and

PostGIS spatial database, allowing

customers to support a complete

open source Web-mapping stack.

Free PDF viewer

for spatial analysis

Global Map Systems Inc. (GMS)

announced free map viewing solution

called LOGIQ Viewer. GMS has part-

nered with Glyph & Cog to offer map

users an industry-specific free PDF

viewer for spatial analysis.

This new release offers map-makers

an ideal way to deliver location intelli-

gence and true GIS analysis to field

technicians, construction crews, mili-

tary and homeland security personnel.

Map users with no GIS training now

have free access to powerful GIS

analysis tools all running inside a

portable PDF map.

GeoViewer from

LizardTech

LizardTech, announced the release of

GeoViewer 3.0, now offered as a free,

standalone application for viewing

geospatial

imagery and

vector over-

lays.

GeoViewer

3.0 enables

users to view

and export

layers from

varied sources, such as local reposito-

ries, Express Server catalogues, and

WMS and JPIP servers. GeoViewer

supports a wide range of input for-

mats and exports to GeoTIFF, PNG

and JPEG.

>> BusinessIRRIS is 10 and going strong

GeoDecisions recently commemorated

the 10-year anniversary of its IRRIS tech-

nology. Since its inception in 1999, IRRIS

has utilised the latest advances in IT, GIS

and LBS to aid decision makers in coordi-

nating response, managing assets and

tracking equipment or personnel

through a common operating picture. A

secure geospatial Web application, IRRIS

provides users with the access, knowl-

edge, and visibility to effectively view,

analyse, and track mobile assets on a global basis. It incorporates and displays worldwide

infrastructure data, live-vehicle tracking, near-real-time weather, and active route condi-

tions in a map format. A commercial version of IRRIS provides comprehensive asset man-

agement and logistics capabilities.

Genesys is USDA's private vendor

The Department of Agriculture (USDA), For-

eign Agricultural Service (FAS), Office of

Global Analysis (OGA), announced Genesys

International Corporation Limited as the

latest addition to the Prime Vendor Con-

tract. Genesys is a provider of remote sens-

ing and GIS services and is the only Indian

company providing remote sensing services

to USDA for satellite data analysis. OGA is

responsible for global crop condition assessments and estimates of area, yield, and produc-

tion for grains, oilseeds and cotton. The primary mission of OGA is to target, collect,

analyse and disseminate timely, objective, useful, and cost-effective global crop condition

and agricultural market intelligence information. One of OGA’s key missions is to provide

unbiased commodity estimates and forecasts to create a marketing edge for U.S. produc-

ers in world markets.

CygNet partners with ESRI

CygNet Software, provider of enterprise operations platform for oil and gas industry,

announced it is partnering with ESRI through its developer programme to integrate GIS

capabilities and data into CygNet's next-generation SCADA offering. The CygNet enterprise

operations platform is currently used by more than 100 companies across oil and gas explo-

ration, production and gas transportation to improve operational efficiency and market

responsiveness. Based on a proven, revolutionary network architecture, users across every

business function can prioritise and analyse massive amounts of real-time and historical

information to support daily operations, strategic decision making and regulatory reporting

requirements.

July 200912 GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 13: Global July 09

>> Applications

13GIS DEVELOPMENT

GIS on BlackBerry awards

Research In Motion and

TDC Group announced the

1st Annual GIS on Black-

Berry awards. Coinciding

with the ESRI International

User Conference, the GIS

on BlackBerry awards will

recognise the best GIS

applications using

Freeance Mobile software

on BlackBerry smart-

phones.

Win valuable award prizes

including Freeance Mobile

software and training,

BlackBerry smartphones and Ricoh 500SE GPS enabled

cameras. A special award category - BlackBerry Beacon -

is open to organisations who want to launch GIS on Black-

Berry smartphones. Winners and finalists are chosen in

each these categories: Best application for public safety;

Best application for government; Best application for

field services organization; BlackBerry Beacon for innova-

tive applications in the planning stage.

GIS tech in the kite capital

Living in the kite capital of the world means lovely Satur-

day afternoons for most residents of Lincoln County, Ore-

gon. However, for utility crews, it means extensive

efforts to keep the power flowing despite outrageous

winds that send trees crashing into electric lines. Central

Lincoln People’s Utility District found a faster way to pre-

vent and fix such outages with vegetation and outage

management based on

GIS technology from

ESRI. The utility serves

approximately 38,000

customers along the

central Oregon coast—a

strip 100 miles long and

2 miles wide.

Europe data for ArcPad

ESRI and Tele Atlas, announced the addition of Europe data

to the ArcPad 8 StreetMap extension. ArcPad now includes

both North American and pan-European data that can be

accessed by users at no additional cost. The ArcPad

StreetMap extension includes ESRI StreetMap Premium data

derived from the latest high-quality digital maps from Tele

Atlas for use in ArcPad on a variety of mobile devices.

Users can leverage ArcPad and the StreetMap extension to

enable display, address geocoding, reverse geocoding and

routing. This extension supports Smart Data Compression

(SDC) format. With ArcPad, you can perform reliable field

data collection, improve the productivity and accuracy of

your GIS information and share enterprise data with field

staff for rapid decision making.

Custom Landsat imagery

on the Web

Science Applications International Cor-

poration (SAIC) has launched

a Web-based processing sys-

tem delivering custom Land-

sat imagery directly to cus-

tomer desktops. Landsat

satellites collect images of

Earth from space that can be

used to evaluate changes to

our planet caused by natural

processes and human prac-

tices. SAIC's custom imagery

can be used by land use/cover

professionals (researchers, resource

managers and policy makers) for crop manage-

ment, drought monitoring, climate change detection, disas-

ter relief, water resource management and other applica-

tions. The new SAIC system provides fast and reliable data

supported by experienced scientists and imaging experts,

leveraging the 37-year-old USGS Landsat archive made avail-

able by the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science

(EROS) Center in Sioux Falls, SD.

July 2009

Page 14: Global July 09

Land cover data

layers available

An integrated national data layer, the

GeoBase Land Cover layer, is made

available in Canada now. This layer is

the result of collaborative work

between Agriculture and Agri-Food

Canada (AAFC), Natural Resources

Canada (NRCan), the Canadian

Space Agency and Canadian

provinces and territories. Specific

land classification processing was car-

ried out by AAFC and NRCan’s

Canadian Forest Service, Canada

Centre for Remote Sensing, and Cen-

tre for Topographic Information –

Sherbrooke. This data layer is built

from various sources of classified land

cover data.

GIS DEVELOPMENT July 200914

>> Navteq in News

Map coverage

extended

NAVTEQ announced the availability of

its premier navigable map in the

Bahamas, St. Barts and the Cayman

Islands. With the addition of this cov-

erage, NAVTEQ now provides digital

map coverage to the most popular

American vacation destinations in the

region. From

tourists who come to the islands to

enjoy the breathtaking beaches to

local residents, NAVTEQ maps provide

a wealth of information to enable

turn-by-turn navigation. Coverage for

the Bahamas includes approximately

1,230 km of road network. St. Barts

and The Cayman Islands include

approximately 477 km of roads com-

bined.

MetroPCS to get

map data

NAVTEQ has been selected as the pre-

ferred map supplier for the location

based services of MetroPCS, provider

of wireless communication service.

MetroPCS has launched several end-

user applications that use NAVTEQ

map data, including MetroNavigator, a

GPS-enabled navigation application.

MetroNavigator is a downloadable

application that enables turn-by-turn

driving directions, local search and

maps on GPS-enabled handsets.

SPOTCana to

monitor plantations

Spot Image and Infoterra, announced

the launch of SPOTCana in Brazil.

This is a new service tailored to moni-

toring sugar cane plantations.

Spot Image, with support from

Infoterra, is proposing an online sub-

scription service to give the sugar

industry—cane growers, distilleries,

environmental departments and

insurance companies—precise, ready-

to-use maps throughout the growth

cycle. Subscribers can thus acquire

information to closely monitor their

crops, ascertain growth, maturity and

stress.

CBERS images

for free

The Brazilian government informed

that Egypt will soon start receiving

images from the CBER satellite,

jointly owned by Brazil and China. A

memorandum for expanding the

satellite's reception to three stations

in Africa was signed, during president

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's trip to Chi-

na. Stations in the Canary Islands and

in South Africa will also receive the

signal. Images from the Cbers are dis-

tributed free of charge, but require a

reception system.

In Brazil, the images are used

by organisations such as the Brazilian

Institute for Geography and Statis-

tics.

Australia

Navman to use

Navteq's maps

NAVTEQ announced an agreement with

Navman that it will utilise the NAVTEQ

map of Australia in its entire range of

PND’s. With this new agreement,

NAVTEQ will be the preferred map sup-

plier for MiTAC, who owns Navman, Mio

& Magellan in Australia. The relationship

between NAVTEQ and Navman in Aus-

tralia began in October 2008 when Nav-

man selected NAVTEQ to supply map

data and content for S-series devices.

Page 15: Global July 09

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Page 16: Global July 09

London at 12.5cm

resolution

Getmapping has released the detailed

aerial imagery of London and it is

available for immediate download

from Getmapping.com. The new

imagery covers the whole of central

London stretching from Heathrow

and the M25 in the West to the

Thames Estuary in the East. The

imagery was captured using the latest

digital camera technology providing

rich colour definition & ground detail.

Each image pixel is equivalent to 12.5

cm on the ground making it possible

to see very fine detail right down to

road markings and street furniture.

Detailed UKMap -

not from OS

The GeoInformation Group annou-

nced an innovative mapping pro-

gramme. UKMap is UK’s commercially

funded, large-scale topographic map-

ping and address database created com-

pletely independent of Ordnance Sur-

vey. It is a feature rich mapping database

which comprises of integrated map lay-

ers and attribute tables. Captured for

use at 1:1,000 scale, UKMap includes

buildings with 3D information & road

detail It also includes aerial photography

and terrain layers.

Scotland gets

access to OS data

Public sector organisations in Scotland

now have access to Ordnance Survey

mapping data under a single agreement

for the first time. Local and central gov-

ernment organisations, as well as some

Scottish NHS members, will now bene-

fit from being part of a single agreement

for OS data. This agreement, known

as “One Scotland”, includes 72 organisa-

tions, with provision for over 100

more, and will result in significant cost

savings and greater data sharing. It

will give access to a wide range of

geographic data to aid the provision of

public services.

EUROPE

3D models of cities

throughout Europe

Blom has completed the

production of the first 40

high quality 3D models,

Blom3D, of European

cities. The Blom3D mod-

els have been delivered to

Tele Atlas for integration

into navigation; LBS and

mapping solutions. Blom3D is produced in four differ-

ent definition levels; 3D blocks, 3D blocks including

roof details, pattern-texturised 3D blocks with roof

details and full real image-view texturised 3D buildings.

The real image view texturised buildings are created by

combining oblique aerial images based on Pictometry

technology with the 3D blocks.

GIS DEVELOPMENT16 July 2009

Page 17: Global July 09
Page 18: Global July 09

Olajide Kufoniyi

Secretary General, AfricanAssociation of Remote Sensing of the Environment(AARSE)[email protected].

18

Geoinformation uptake

Uptake of GI inAfrica requiresconcerted efforts to provide enablingenvironment toensure thatgeospatial info permeates everyaspect of society

GIS DEVELOPMENT

Global efforts have been and arecontinually being made to attainsustainable development in allparts of the world. These include

collective setting of goals and agenda suchas the UN global Millennium DevelopmentGoals (MDG). For example, at the Africancontinent level, the New Partnership forAfrica’s Development (NEPAD) by theAfrican Union and CODIST are striving toprovide enabling environment for sustain-able development. However, uptake of GI inAfrica still requires concerted efforts to pro-vide enabling environment ‘to ensure thatgeospatial information permeates everyaspect of society and is made available topeople who need it, when they need it andin a form that they can use it to make deci-sions with minimal pre-processing’ for sus-tainable development.

Overview of status of

geospatial information

To make geospatial datasets available, dis-coverable, better accessible, shareable,interoperable and re-usable much attentionhas been paid to the development of spatialdata infrastructures (SDI) in Africa throughthe efforts of CODI-Geo. However, the SDIdevelopment is progressing very slowly atnational levels and appears to be gettingpoor political support and inadequate partic-ipation of stakeholders. The fundamentaldatasets are either not available at all orthey are largely not available in the form andcurrency required. For example, in manycountries, 1:50,000 topographic maps thatcommonly serve as base maps are out-of-date and in analog form; cadastralmaps/databases are mostly not availablewhile in most cases geodetic controls arenot yet unified and adjusted and are not insufficient density. The 2008 USGS AfricaRemote Sensing Study indicated that about60% of respondents mentioned inadequacyof ground control points as a major stum-

bling block to geospatial data production.About the same number of respondentsreported that elevation data are not ade-quate in many African countries. The situa-tion is similar with respect to the other fun-damental datasets. On data accessibilityand dissemination, only 2% of the popula-tion of Africa has Internet access thusnecessitating efforts to increase this num-ber by huge investments either in communication satellites or by improvingthe undersea cable infrastructure.

The use of earth observation satellite (EOS)data to generate development information is rapidly improving in Africa fol-lowing the launching of EOS by Africancountries – Algeria, Nigeria, Egypt andSouth Africa which led to increased awareness in decision makers and civil soci-ety regarding the applications of EOS andGIS. The availability of free archived Land-sat data and SRTM DEMs and cheapalternatives like ASTER data are mak-ing satellite data become moreaffordable thereby contributing tothe increase in the uptake ofgeospatial technology inAfrica while users are alsoeagerly awaiting theCBERS-2B imageswhich will be madeavailable free ofcharge. Therecognitionof the

Of road

blocks and

building blocks

July 2009

A

Page 19: Global July 09

immense opportunities offered by EO systems for regional coopera-tion and development has also led to the encouraging evolution ofthe concept of an African Resource Management Satellite (ARMS)constellation programme that includes Algeria, Nigeria and SouthAfrica and which is expected to welcome other African countriesinterested in joining the venture.

Even though Landsat and SPOT are the two most popular satelliteimagery used in the continent according to the USGS Survey, thesame survey indicated that the most desired spatial resolution forsatellite images is 1 m – 5 m, followed by 63 cm – 90 cm and then5 m – 120 m. Consequently, accessibility to high resolution imagesneeds to be given adequate attention. Again, a GEO-Africa satellitewith 25 m resolution XS and 75m SWIR, 300 km swath and dailyrevisit being proposed will serve very useful role in the generation offundamental datasets for SDI in Africa. As commendable as the cur-rent efforts are towards providing enabling environment for theuptake of GI in Africa, we need to identify the existing challenges

and provide solutions to them. Some of these challenges are indicat-ed in the following sub-section.

Factors for slow progress in uptake

The primary data source for mapping is EO satellite images.Although numerous EO satellites are available globally, accessibilityto satellite images when needed in Africa is still difficult. This is a for-midable challenge to the contribution of EOS to the uptake of GI inAfrica. Apart from the long revisit period of majority of the satellites,Africa faces a lot of challenges in the use of the existing systems.These include:

• 1Difficulty of getting archived and current images inAfrican countries due to the archiving policy of image produc-ers: images are most often only acquired based upon com-mercial request which means that any area that has neverbeen requested for will not have any image in the archive.

July 2009 19GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 20: Global July 09

GIS DEVELOPMENT20

• 1Absence of permanent receiving stations in the region forthe commercial high and medium resolution sensors exceptfor the African-owned satellites (Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria andSouth Africa) and Landsat-5 in South Africa. This retardsdirect data reception and the processing of high-resolutionsatellite images thus increasing the overall cost of satelliteimage acquisition.

• 1Inadequacy of geodetic reference points for geo-refer-encing of images and other survey and mapping applications.

Essential building blocks for GI uptake

National Geodetic Reference Frame

There is a preponderance of inadequate national geodetic controlsin Africa to the extent that survey plans required for the registrationof land titles are still being tied to a local origin determined by solaror stellar observations. Mere sketches are even acceptable officiallyin some cases. Apart from the fact that the planimetric controls maybe based on different coordinate systems, they are usually not uni-fied with the vertical controls. To facilitate adequate and fit-for-usegeospatial data for various applications, it is therefore necessary tointensify the implementation of AFREF as well as other nationalgeodetic control networks.

Geo-information Archives

Information archives are in general, a critical component of any infra-structure for the enabling environment for innovation. Much of the GIarchives in Africa are still paper-based and this limits their accessibil-ity. In many cases, the data are so obsolete that new mapping isrequired yet it is also essential to convert the obsolete maps to digi-tal for time-series analyses. This leads to double costs that will bedifficult to sell to the political decision makers. It is therefore neces-sary to address this issue of converting the existing analoganaloguedata and the appropriate archiving of the converted existing data andthe newly produced current digital data.

National Mapping and Geo-information Policies

As a result of the promotion of the development of SDI in Africa,many African countries have realised the need to implement compo-nents of the infrastructure. They are also conscious of the need toadopt policies for promoting greater awareness and public access tostandard and coordinated geospatial data production, managementand dissemination by all sectors including the establishment of ageospatial data clearinghouse at various levels in the country (local,state and federal) with linkages with the private sector. Towards theachievement of the foregoing objectives, various countries have put(or are putting) in place modalities to produce a national GI policy,which will certainly eliminate most of the problems experienced byGI producers and users. In addition to having a national GI policy, it isnecessary to put in place a national mapping policy to address indetail the activities of national topographic mapping, provision ofgeodetic framework as well as cadastral mapping including thefunding modalities. These cannot be treated in depth within thenational GI policy and its absence can deter production of these vitalfundamental datasets.

Funding Issues Not less than 2.5% of the national budget each year has been gen-erally advocated but the amount allocated is often typically a far cry

from this percentage. Unfortunately such budgetary provision oftendoes not take into consideration the amount generated by theagency; a high income generating agency may still attract inade-quate budgetary provision. This situation can be substantiallyreduced by granting autonomy to the agencies. This will allow theagency to be properly funded and thus be in a position to implementnew innovation systems in its production strategies.

Human Capacity buildingTo be fully utilised, the acquisition of GI technology must be comple-mented by readily available skilled manpower. It is noted that region-al GI capacity is improving in Africa with many African countries par-ticipating in a variety of notable space technology initiatives. Many GIprofessionals, technologists and technicians were trained in theobsolete methods of map production whereas, the introduction of GItechnology demands a critical mass of well-trained staff at all levelsin a reasonable time frame.

Given that many organisations in African countries are unable toafford the costs to send their staff abroad for (re)training pro-grammes except through (limited) external funding support fromdonor countries and agencies, and considering the number of per-sons to be trained before achieving capacity utilisation, it is neces-sary to provide alternative solutions through educational networkingof institutions in developed and African countries, i.e., through cross-border education and Web based education/e-learning. Internation-al organisations like ISPRS, GEO and FIG have put in place workinggroups and committees to evolve the necessary modalities andframeworks for effective cross border education. It is also importantto strengthen national and regional institutions of higher learning toenable each country to have capacity for research and developmen-tal efforts in its national institutions.

Infrastructure and Access

It is noted that successful uptake of innovative systems in Africa islargely constrained by non-availability of efficient national infrastruc-tures. Adequate and appropriate infrastructure - from communica-tions network to power – including widespread access to such infra-structure, particularly in rural areas, are essential for building theknowledge economy. Thus there is a strong economic justificationfor genuine national investment on the national infrastructure.

Also, the bandwidth of Internet is often too low to support image andgeospatial information transfer. One of the factors for this is that theinternet service providers within the countries require huge foreignexchange to pay for the Internet backbones located outside Africa. Itis noted that a few African countries including Egypt, Nigeria andMorocco have communication satellites but the services of thesesatellites should be maximised to promote regional development inAfrica through special pan-Africa price regime that will contribute toappreciable increase in the density as well as the bandwidth of Inter-net services.

Private Sector Simulation

Globally, the private sector has driven technological innovation andthe growth of knowledge economy. It is therefore necessary toensure effective indigenous private sector involvement in the pro-duction and management of geospatial data through job outsourcingand public-private sector partnerships. A more flexible data policyshould be floated by commercial image suppliers to accommodatere-use of data by government organisations as well as free data foreducation and research.

July 2009

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Page 22: Global July 09

Tanzania is in early stages of

NSDI development

MANDATE AND GEOINFO AVAILABILITYThe mandate of the Surveys and Mapping Division of the Ministry ofLands is to carry out the surveys and prepare maps in Tanzania at differ-ent scales. We are responsible for all the survey and mapping informationin Tanzania. We have about 1,626 topographic sheets at a scale of1:50,000. We have initiated a project called JICA with Japan. Under this,we have already updated the mines data in areas like Victoria zone. Atpresent, we are in the process of updating maps of about 15 districts inthe country with the help of World Bank fund.

ON ADOPTION OF LATEST TECHNOLOGIESIn terms of technology adoption, we are trying to cope with the latestdevelopments by training our manpower. We are adopting digital tech-nology. Particularly our surveying and mapping division is using GPSequipment to produce maps. All our maps in the scale of 1:50,000 aredigitised. We are now trying to vectorise 1: 50,000 maps so that we canupdate them whenever the need arises.

ON SDI INITIATIVESSDI activities are still at an early stage in Tanzania. From 2002 to 2007,we tried to prepare the policy for NSDI because we thought that by hav-ing a policy, we can get the guidelines, rules and regulations for differentinstitutions to bring out their data and then we will be able to share itwithin our ministries.

ON LACK OF FUNDS AND TRAINED MANPOWERThe main problem is funding. Due to economic situation, government isnot able to fund for training of people. But we are trying at least everyyear to select a few people to get trained at our universities. We alsoassociate with ITC where we send our people to get formal training.

Ethiopia is on a growth path in

use of geosptial technologies

MANDATE AND GEOINFO AVAILABILITYEthiopian Mapping Agency (EMA) is a government body established bythe proclamation of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Itsmandate is to produce, disseminate and compile fundamental geoinfor-mation datasets such as geodetic reference points, geodetic controlpoints, topographic maps, thematic maps, national atlas and all relatedgeoinformation in Ethiopia. We are also authorised agents of central gov-ernment to certify all works done by individuals or private organisations.

ON ADOPTION OF LATEST TECHNOLOGIESEMA has earlier been producing topographic maps of the country physi-cally. We have so far produced topographic maps of the country with ascale of 1: 2 million, 1: 1 million. Currently, we are producing 1: 50,000maps. Some of these products are digitised but most of these are in ana-log format. We have developed a central strategic plan and our mission isto digitise all maps and continue the production of digital maps in future.

ON PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPSEMA is a government agency. We support the private sector by providingnecessary fundamental geoinformation datasets. We have not yet devel-oped a geoinformation organisation that can handle such responsibilityoutside the government structure but in future, we will support privatesector within the framework of our laws.

ON SDI INITIATIVESWe have taken an initiative to kick-start NSDI in Ethiopia. Previously, wehave established a national committee to work on the policy frameworkfor the establishment of national spatial data infrastructure in our country.But this committee has not been able to deliver the required policy

GIS DEVELOPMENT July 200922

SG Speak

One for the roadOne for the road

Sultan Mohammed

Director General

Ethiopian Mapping Agency, Ethiopia

Dr David Mayunga

Assistant Director, Ministry of Lands

Surveys & Mapping Division, Tanzania

While one is struggling with manual techniques of surveying, the other uses a vast array of latest technologies. While one fights the lack of political will and financial capability, his neighbour is totally motivated. While one is opening

eyes to the idea of SDI, the other is far ahead in the race. Yet, they are all together - discussing the issues, building bridges,sharing experiences and expertise. Associate Editor Bhanu Rekha spoke to Surveyor Generals of African nations to know the

status of geoinformation, challenges and opportunities in their respective countries. Read on to know more...

Page 23: Global July 09

July 2009 GIS DEVELOPMENT

framework so far. Now, we have taken it as our own responsibility and wehave included it in our strategic plan to formulate the NSDI policy and toforward this policy to the government.

ON LACK OF FUNDS AND TRAINED MANPOWEROne of the major problems we face is the availability of skilled manpow-er. EMA is over 50 years and we still lack adequate skills in our resourcesto implement a project. We have made it top priority to focus on capacitybuilding and are trying to work with our partners to get assistance indeveloping existing or creating new human and technological resources.If we have to realise our strategic objectives of providing up-to-date andaccurate geoinformation to our growing number of users of this informa-tion in the country, we have no choice but to develop our resources.

ON FUTURE GROWTHOur aim is to become a centre of excellency in the production and dissemination of fundamental geoinformation in the region. In this regard,we have devised several projects. Ethiopia is on a growth path. We haveachieved double digit growth rate in the past five years which we antici-pate will continue this year as well. So, the need for up-to-date geo-infor-mation is on the increase.

We are looking for partnerships

MANDATE AND GEOINFO AVAILABILITYOur Centre is responsible for the provision of geoinformation in the coun-try. We are also carrying out geographic research programmes. We have1:200,000 maps available for the whole country and maps at 1:50,000scale for 30 % of the country. Not all maps are available digitally though.The digitisation of maps is in progress. We are taking this up in phases.

ON ADOPTION OF LATEST TECHNOLOGIESApart from manual surveys, we are carrying out aerial surveys. We arealso utilising satellite imagery to revise the maps which are at 1:200,000.

ON SDI INITIATIVESWe have been organising meetings, trying to sensitise people. We havewritten a dossier to our ministry enumerating activities of different organ-isations of the government and on the need to build a platform to sharedata. We are awaiting some concrete action.

ON LACK OF FUNDS AND SKILLED MANPOWERWe have only about 20 people in our department who are trained in GISand remote sensing. There is a requirement of training more people.

ON PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS

We looking for partnerships as we do not have either the technology northe human resources to carry out extensive mapping activities.

Namibia is abreast in

latest technologies

MANDATE AND GEOINFO AVAILABILITYThe mandate of Directorate of Survey and Mapping is to collect, maintainand analyse data that has geographical context. We are especially man-dated to look at topographic maps at the scales of 1:50,000 and1:250,000. We are also responsible for the cadastral information. Withrespect to availability, there is no restriction to what's available to the pub-lic and what's not.

ON ADOPTION OF ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIESWe started late but we are fortunate because we started at the pointwhen latest technology was changing. So we started with the adaptationof new technology itself. Our map revision programme from day one in1995 started with digital map revision using digital ortho photos. Withrespect to acquisition of control points we have quite a number of globalpositioning systems which we are using to do that. We are abreast withthe current technology. Our cadastral system is now being digitised andwe have a mandate to develop a cadastral system in this financial year.We have designed a website which was tested. My plan for this financialyear will intend to now implement that website. Within that website weintend to make it possible for our customers to be able to assess it andknow what we offer.

ON PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS

We are looking at partnerships because in doing that, we will be able tomake our data more accessible to the people. What has been a problemis getting a clear policy directive with respect to what payment or non-payment for the particular data.

ON SDI INITIATIVESIf you have a functioning SDI, you will be able to have an efficient LIS.Our cadastral system is well developed in the sense that any plot that isto exchange hands will have to be well defined and that means that wehave the coordinates accurately. Also for all the commercial firms, wehave them well defined and we have captured them digitally. We are nowin the process of digitally capturing all the plots that we have graphically.With that we will be able to develop a functional LIS which will help us tomanage the land. Within national development plan, partnership is some-thing we are looking at because we believe that government cannotfinance and sustain the national spatial data. So public private partner-ships are the way to sustain the programme.

ON MAPPING AFRICA FOR AFRICAI think this is a very interesting option if we are talking at the level ofAfrican Union because that means the policy makers get involved anddirectives come from the policy makers. And it becomes easier to imple-ment because what has been a problem is get by in the policy maker.

Dr Felix Elongo

Director, Centre De RechercheGeographique Et De ProductionCartographique (CERGEC), Congo

Uzochukwu

Godway Ojo

Okafor

Surveyor General

Directorate of Survey and Mapping,Namibia

23

Page 24: Global July 09

GIS DEVELOPMENT July 200924

ON FUTURE GROWTHThe growth has been slow. Also, there isn't much awareness about appli-cations and that is also one major challenge we are addressing within ourmanagement plan for 2009 and 2010. Because we intend to market ourselves more forcefully and be able to collaborate with stakeholders andbe in a position to showcase what are the applications that could berealised using spatial data, in that way we intend to improve the usage.And also if we have partners in private sector then also we will be in bet-ter position to extend the use of our spatial data.

ON LACK OF FINANCIAL AND HUMAN RESOURCESWithin Namibia we may not have the capacity but within Africa there aresome countries that may have excess capacity and we intend to havethem come in. And while they are there, we can aggressively pursuetraining and skill development with respect to academic qualification andof course to those who are employed. With aspect to the experience theyhave compared to those coming out of academic institutions. So in thatway, we will be able to increase the capacity we have.

The government of Namibia has taken initiatives from late 1990s whenwe have sent several of our students to South Africa and UK. The gov-ernment has also set up a survey training institute in collaboration withITC, the Polytechnic Company of Namibia. This institution is great and atthe technician level, we no longer have acute shortage. But we do haveshortage at the professional level. The problem lies in the fact that man-power, once trained, leaves the department for greener pastures. So, weare looking forward to training more and also developing a strategy toretain those trained. That will form part of minor plan this year.

Botswana started training locally

MANDATE AND GEOINFO AVAILABILITYWe are the national mapping agency of Botswana and a cadastralauthority. We examine, service and archive land records. Most of ourcadastral records are in paper format. We are trying to digitise them foreasy access. We have conducted aerial survey of the whole country at 1:80,000 scale in 2001-2002 and then made a orthophotomap for thewhole country, which is about 974 sheets. Now we are gradually makingthose at 1:50,000 line mapping. We have completed that for more than50% of the country. Mapping data is readily available in Botswana, but ata cost. There are several resource maps that you can buy off the shelf.

ON ADOPTION OF LATEST TECHNOLOGIESUsually, Botswana has some development plans and in each plan, wehave some budgets, that will be used over a certain period for map upda-tion. So far we have quite a number of projects and we are keeping up-to-date with technology.

ON SDI INITIATIVESWe have done a study on how GIS can help the country which was a sortof blueprint for establishing NSDI. We completed phase one under theMinistry of Science and Technology. Right now the responsibility is trans-ferred to the Ministry of Lands and Housing. So, who will be putting somesignificant efforts. There will be working groups on standards and meta-data so that we can start SDI. W also organized a national conference in2007 on how NSDI could be built in Bostawana.

ON PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPSSo far, I don't see any public private partnerships but the thinking at thenational level is that we should promote public private partnerships withinterested parties but so far we have not done the spade work in thisregard. Government is fully committed to improve mapping in Bostawana.Every year, our national budget gives provision to update as many mapsas possible. There are several mapping projects and our mapping pro-grammes are fully funded by the government.

ON LACK OF FUNDS AND TRAINED MANPOWERLot of efforts are being taken up in Bostawana in this direction. Previ-ously, we used to get our people trained in Europe and Australia butbecause of limited funding, the government encouraged us to set uptraining institutes locally. The University of Bostawana has introduced adegree in geomatics. The first intake was last year. So, in three yearstime, we should have quite a good supply of manpower. Even the resid-ing officers are applying for this course. We look forward to cooperationwith other institutions especially for transfer of technology because tomaintain our systems up-to-date and to keep our manpower, we need tohave some goodwill from other sectors.

GB Habana

Department of Surveys and MappingMinistry of Lands and HousingBotswana

Page 25: Global July 09

Zimbabwe looking at partnerships

MANDATE AND GEOINFO AVAILABILITYThe Department of Surveyor General is the national mapping agency ofZimbabwe. Our mandate is spelt out in the National Survey Act. Thereare four departments under this, three of which are technical. We have acadastral branch, a geodetic branch and a mapping branch. These threebranches spell out our mandates. We are in-charge of all national mapseries in the country. We also examine and approve cadastral information.We examine, approve and regularise that data. Last but not the least, weare also in-charge of all the geodetic control. We actually carry out geo-detic surveys and and we maintain geodetic reference points. The otherdepartment is to provide support services, administration and finance. Wehave several challenges as far as our mapping data is concerned. Data isavailable but the major challenge is that it is out-of-date. The last update

was done about 20 years ago, so it is all analog. We are trying to digitiseall the existing data but the conversion process is happening at a slowpace as we have several challenges in terms of finances and skilledhuman resources.

ON ADOPTION OF LATEST TECHNOLOGYZimbabwe has started using GPS equipment for surveying 3-4 yearsago. However, we are trying to acquire other new mapping technologiesfor the mapping of natural resources in the country, for which we havegot funds from the government at present.

ON PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPSWe are looking for partnerships. For day-to-day functioning of the depart-ment, we utilise government funds but to take up intensive mappingactivities, we need the assistance of private sector.

ON SDI INITIATIVESThis is a good initiative. However, in terms of SDI in Zimbabwe, we havemany stakeholders involved. What is happening is we have not beenspearheading this initiative, but it is hoped that we spearhead so that ourstakeholders benefit. The major reason is that ours is a governmentdepartment and we have to look for a policy direction. This policy frame-work is being out right now to build a national SDI in Zimbabwe.

ON FUTURE GROWTHI see a lot of interesting things happening in terms of stake holders. We,as a national mapping organisation, are supposed to lead several initia-tives but everything is boiling down to public private partnerships. Withour department giving us opportunity in this direction, I strongly believewe can reach great heights.

Edwin Guvaza

Surveyor GeneralDepartment of the Surveyor GeneralZimbabwe

Page 26: Global July 09

GIS DEVELOPMENT26

Interview

How does ECA contribute in

building inclusive, people-centred

knowledge societies vis-à-vis

geospatial technologies?

The United Nations Economic Commissionfor Africa (ECA) is the regional office of theUN in Africa with a mandate to promotethe economic and social development of itsmember States, foster intra-regional inte-gration, and promote international coopera-tion for Africa's development. ECA's workprogramme focuses on achieving results intwo related and mutually supportive areas:i) Promoting regional integration in supportof the African Union vision and priorities; ii)Meeting Africa's special needs and emerging global challenges. The activitiesof the Commission are divided into programmatic areas among which the ICT, Science and Technology Division(ISTD) plays a pivotal role in “HarnessingInformation for Development”.

The impact of rapid globalisation and theemerging new global economic emphasis-es the importance of information andknowledge products as raw resource fordriving economic change, restructuringbusinesses, affecting skills and employ-ment, contributing to growth, and facilitat-ing the opening of markets through a widerand faster flow of information and knowl-edge.

Within its programme of Harnessing Infor-mation for Development, ECA implementsand supports activities aiming to assistAfrican member States to improve theunderstanding and the use of spatiallyenabled information technologies for deci-sion-making in various sectors of develop-ment. The Commission fully recognises thatgeoinformation systems and related disci-

plines are information development tools inthe knowledge economy and constitute thedriving force of many applications andstreamlined online services. Indeed,geospatial science and technologies offer aradically different way in which we produceand use information and knowledgerequired to manage our communities andeconomic activities, making it possible forany user or decision maker to know whatinformation resources are available, wherethey are and to be in a position to appraisethem in relation to his/her needs and tohis/her homeland or community’s future.Such integration provides the framework ofthe “Community Knowledge System” thatshould enhance and sustain the AfricanInformation Society and Knowledge Econo-my ECA is advocating.

Lack of social infrastructure is a

major reason of concern in many

countries of African continent.

How is ECA partnering with

governments and NGO in enabling

the use of geospatial technologies

for this?

Geospatial technologies in economic devel-opment have influenced decision-supportsystems strongly in evaluating alternativesto enhance decisions and to achieve spe-cific objectives. To ensure that appropriategeoinformation products are used in policymaking and hence sustainable develop-ment, ECA is encouraging and assistingmember States, both government and private sector, to evolve a mapping policy,create state/national topographical database, invest in capacity building. That isbest done by adopting an infrastructure like NSDI, the backbone of the challengefor using geoinformation for developmentin Africa. Today with ECA support, a significant number of countries have takensteps for developing national geoinforma-tion policies as well as legal / institutionalframeworks. Close attention is given to thecontinental integration and harmonisationof the NSDIs under the umbrella of the African Regional Geospatial Data Infrastructure (ARGDI) and their linkagewith the National Information and Commu-nication Infrastructure (NICI) plans.

Lack of trained human resources is

a cause of great concern in every

nation of Africa. As an enabling

platform, any initiatives from ECA

to facilitate training and retaining

of manpower?

Individual, institutional and infrastructurecapacity are essential in the continent

Aida Opoku-Mensah

Director

ICTs and S&T Division (ISTD)

UN Economic Commission for Africa

July 2009

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GIS DEVELOPMENT

development. Even if geospatial scienceand technology is mature enough to bringappropriate responses to the growingdemand from users - for simple, convenientaccess to online information, products andservices, capacity building is still a keychallenge in Africa. As human resourcedevelopment is the main factor for eco-nomic prosperity, it is important that priorityis accorded to investing in human capacitydevelopment. That is why ECA is partner-ing with its regional centres of excellenceRECTAS and RCMRD to develop trainingprogrammes in geoinformation technolo-gies and their applications in resourceassessment, planning, management andmonitoring such as to attract, stabilise andretain a sustainable human resources inAfrica. ECA is also making substantiveeffort to enable member States participa-tion at important regional geo-relatedevents (such as AfricaGIS, AARSE Confer-ence, GeoSpatial Africa, etc...) where many

key decisions are taken. These assembliesprovide ideal opportunities to prominentlydisseminate the Commission’s vision andperspectives for geospatial science andtechnology development in the continent.The aim is finally to empower people (technicians, decision-makers, communi-ties, etc..) to do as much as possible bythemselves: not only for the productionbut on top of this, for the application ofgeoinformation products and services.

What are the challenges for the

uptake of geospatial technology in

Africa? What are ECA’s initiatives

in this direction?

Despite the importance of geospatial sci-ence and technology in knowledge genera-tion and application, geoinformation stilldoes not arouse political interest and manyAfrican policy makers do not view knowl-edge management in long-term perspec-tive to enable investment in the infrastruc-ture needed. A key challenge for thegeoinformation community in Africa is theneed for closer linkage between thegeoinformation products and societalbenefits. Therefore, we believe that anyprocess should start in the minds ofthe people, the mind of the mostinfluential ones in these two fields.

• Decision-makers awareness rais-ing through advocacy workshops,media campaigns, etc.

• Evolutionary prototypingapproach through developmentof spatially enabled e-govern-ment services, where geospatialinformation products and servic-es are developed to stir up theeconomies. In keeping with globaltrends and with view to enhancethe SDI implementation, ECA ismoving toward the development ofSpatially-Enabled Government Ser-vices (SEGS) that will foster theaccessibility of spatial data and theuse of spatial information technolo-gies in government day-to-day

business processes and on-lineservices delivery.

How is the response from the

member States to the initiatives

of ECA?

Despite the efforts of ECA and other part-ners, progress in developing SDIs in Africahas been very slow, due mainly to poorawareness and understanding of the linkbetween the content and components ofthe SDI and the day-to-day decisions andactivities of the society. Given the limitedfinancial resources available to govern-ments, priority is given to supposedly morepressing activities without realising thedependence of most of them on the avail-ability of timely, accurate and reliablegeoinformation resources.

ECA has responded by seeking to integrate SDI policies into the very successful work on National Informationand Communication Infrastructure (NICI)plans and strategies to mainstream geoinformation services into nationaleconomies. We are continuously recordingrequests from member States to assist instrengthening their national geoinformationresources. Today, we are observing anincrease awareness of African govern-ments and other sectors of society on the importance of geoinformation insocioeconomic development as a tool tofacilitate spatial data collection, access and use in the decision-making processes,both nationally and regionally, through aparticipatory approach.

What are the future plans of ECA

in promoting networking among

institutions and practitioners in

geoinformation?

The Commission continues to collaborateand coordinate its activities with otheragencies in UN system, with internationaland regional associations and programmes,and other development partners, as animportant vehicle for mobilising financialresources and technical know-how in support of Africa’s developments in thefield of geoinformation. Efforts have beenmade to develop partnership with regionaland international organisations throughcontribution and participation to severalforums on geoinformation at national andsub-regional levels: Group on Earth Observation (GEO), GMES, etc.

On the other hand, the Commission promotes the adoption of cooperative, multi-stakeholder approach to production,management, and dissemination of data atnational and regional level in Africa.

27July 2009

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African governments lack

both the political will and

the capacity to collect,

manage and use key geospatial infor-

mation effectively over their respec-

tive national territories. This situa-

tion exists despite the documented

role geospatial information plays in

the majority of public decisions. It

has been reported by the UN MDG

Africa Steering Group that, with a

few exceptions, Africans countries

will probably not achieve their Mil-

lennium Development Goals

(MDGs). The recommendations

made by this group for African coun-

tries to vastly improve the MDG suc-

cess rate depend heavily on the effec-

tive use of relevant geospatial infor-

mation. The collection, management

and dissemination of the fundamen-

tal geospatial information are gener-

ally the responsibility of national

mapping organisation.

From an African perspective, there

are two key structures which bring

Dr Derek Clarke

Chief Director: Surveys andMapping, Department of Rur-al Development and LandReform, South [email protected]

GIS DEVELOPMENT28 July 2009

Target - MDGs

Mapping

Africa for Africa

Mapping

Africa for Africa

Lack of politicalwill, financial capability andskilled manpower -African nations arebattling out allodds to unite geodetically

Page 29: Global July 09

together the senior officials of the national

mapping organisations to discuss matters of

common interest. One is the Cambridge

Conference of Heads of National Mapping Organisations,

held in Cambridge, England every four years. The other,

focussed on Africa, is the Committee for Development

Information, Science and Technology (Sub-committee on

Geoinformation) (CODIST-Geo), which is a structure of

the UN ECA, and meets every two years. At the meetings

of both these structures, especially CODIST-Geo, the

attendees conclude by accepting resolutions on issues

that need attention. These resolutions are accepted with

good intent and with hopes of them having an impact on

the mandates of the national mapping organisations.

At the following meeting of these structures countries

are requested to report on the progress with the imple-

mentation of these resolutions. Most African countries

report that little or no progress has been achieved, despite

good intent by the national mapping organisation. Their

reports indicate, almost without fail, that there has been

no funding and capacity to implement the resolutions,

lamenting on the lack of political commitment. Then at

the same meeting a number of new resolutions are

accepted, with the same result of non-implementation.

The resolutions from these meetings are generally power-

ful and well intended and if implemented would address

the key issues of geospatial information collection, dis-

semination and usage. The pattern of making resolutions

but not been able to implement them has been noted

with great frustration.

It was realised that this pattern could not continue.

Something practical had to be done to address the prob-

lem. A meeting of African NMOs and other interested

parties was held in Durban, South Africa in August 2003,

coinciding with the meeting of ICA. The result of this

meeting was the Durban Statement on Mapping Africa

for Africa. This Statement includes a number of actions

to be taken by African countries and regional and interna-

tional organisations. The intention is that this will be

driven by Africans with the support and collaboration of

international partners. The Durban State-

ment has been endorsed by the ICA and

CODIST-Geo, with each setting up a Work-

ing Group to work on the Mapping Africa for

Africa initiative. These two working groups

are working closely together, with the ICA

working group primarily providing an inter-

national reference forum.

The lack of relevant and reliable geospatial

information in Africa has informed the first

projects to be undertaken in the Mapping

Africa for Africa initiative. The first two main projects are

the African Reference Frame project (AFREF) and the

fundamental geospatial datasets project. An important

requirement for the creation of consistent regional

geospatial information is to have a uniform geospatial ref-

erence framework, providing a basis for integrating dis-

parate datasets spatially. The AFREF project has the

objective of providing such a reference framework based

on GNSS technology. The Fundamental Geospatial

Datasets project consists of a number of sub-projects.

July 2009 GIS DEVELOPMENT 29

This initiativewill be driven by

Africans withthe support ofinternational

partners

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Data, information and knowledge are fundamental to informationeconomy. They offer additional value and greater applicability whenthey can be represented spatially. Today, geoinformation is firmlyrecognised as a necessary ingredient in local and national level plan-ning. Given the exigency of geoinformation products in social andeconomic development value chain, it was felt that that all Africancountries should have a geographically comprehensive and high-quality repository of core geospatial data sets. To enable this, theFundamental Geospatial Datasets project has been initiated. The fol-lowing sub-projects have been completed under this.

Projects Completed

Determine fundamental geospatial datasets

In the first sub-project, a definition for fundamental geospatialdatasets and the criteria used to determine the fundamental geospa-tial datasets was the basis for arriving at the definitive list of funda-mental geospatial datasets for Africa. This followed an extensive con-sultative process with users. This definition and the list of fundamen-tal geospatial datasets for Africa were approved by CODIST-Geo inMay 2007. It makes a significant contribution to the understanding ofgeospatial information.

Determine available fundamental datasets

This required cataloguing the available fundamental geospatialdatasets (in-country and foreign data holdings) for each country. Cat-aloguing fundamental geospatial datasets available for Africa hasshown that there is a lot of such data available, but that this data isgenerally either out of date, inaccurate or at a level of detail inappro-priate for most applications or has been collected by and is held byforeign organisations. This supports the statement thatAfrica is poorly mapped. The study

showed that very little (approximately 8%) of the data had metadata.The catalogue of available fundamental geospatial datasets and itsmetadata is available at the clearinghouse of the UNECA (at thewebsite: //geoinfo.uneca.org :8080/metadataexplorer/ explorer.jsf).

Determine gaps in fundamental datasets

This task involved preparing a gap analysis for each African countryon the fundamental geospatial datasets required. It must be notedthat the gap report is based on the information that was provided forthe catalogue of available fundamental geospatial datasets and istherefore only as good as the information provided. The organisationin each country that is responsible for fundamental geospatialdatasets, probably the NMO, is requested to update the catalogue,including updating the metadata at the UNECA clearinghouse, andto use the findings of the report to their advantage in their futurework programmes. The gap analysis report for each country was dis-tributed at the CODIST-Geo meeting in May 2007.

TASKS AHEAD

Guidelines for best practices

The intention here is to provide a comprehensive practical workingdocument for the relevant organisations to use for addressing thelack of geospatial information, the ongoing updating of this informa-tion and to ensure that it is available to and used effectively by theusers (planners, decision makers and others). It is intended to be avaluable resource to countries without them having to 'reinvent thewheel'. The document will include all relevant standards to be used.To complete this document will require a lot of resources from differ-ent experts in the various topics to be covered. The content thatshould be covered is currently being finalised.

Action plan to address gaps

This sub-project undertakes a serious assessment of the needs toaddress the gaps in each country's fundamental geospatial infor-

mation and then to prepare a plan of action. It will include aninvestigation of current capacity and unique requirements

to collect and maintain fundamental geospatial datasetsper country. This work will primarily be undertaken by

the country itself with support from the project teamand others. Without the buy-in from the appropriateorganisations in each country this project will fail.

Action plan for integration

Many user requirements for the fundamentalgeospatial information cut across nationalboundaries and therefore it is necessary tointegrate data into regional datasets. Thisprocess should not be a significant taskshould the accepted standards be com-plied with and the best practicesadhered to.

DATA - at the core of development

Fundamental Geospatial Datasets

July 2009GIS DEVELOPMENT32

Page 32: Global July 09

These two projects are ambitious and will take some

years to realise. They will require commitment from each

African country to be a success. The approach of involv-

ing African countries is sure to empower these countries

to sustain the work once the projects have been imple-

mented. It will also ensure that they are appropriate for

African conditions. What remains is to obtain the support

of regional institutions such as the African Union Com-

mission and the NEPAD Secretariat and the African gov-

ernments. The Mapping Africa for Africa initiative is

bringing all appropriate organisations of Africa closer

together to contribute to the development of Africa.

For a vast continent that shares umpteendiversities, varied colonial histories, a spec-trum of developmental needs and aplethora of mapping policies, conceiving acommon platform to bring the countriestogether was a Herculean task. Severalinitiatives are in place for the political,regional and economic integration ofAfrica but with varying degree of success.Today, each African country has its owngeodetic reference systems owing to itscolonial legacy. It is very difficult, ratherimpossible to overlay maps of variouscountries and there is tremendous confu-sion among planners of various countriesas there are multiple datums, ellipsoidsand projections. This is leading to inordi-nate delays in development projects.

Though it has been recognised in the1980s that the solution lies in building aunified reference frame for Africa, it is notuntil 2002 that the idea really took form bywhat is commonly referred to as 'Wind-hoek Declaration'. As a result, the AfricanGeodetic Reference Frame (AFREF) wasconceived. This is a unified geodetic refer-ence frame for the entire continent, con-sistent and homogeneous with Internation-al Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF). Thisis aimed to serve as the basis for nationaland regional 3-dimensional reference net-works. This reference system is expectedto be designed and managed by Africans.This is maintained in close cooperationwith international partners with expertiseand an interest in geodetic referenceframes, especially IAG, International GNSSService (IGS) and UNOOSA. The projectwill be implemented by ECA.

In the initial phase of the project,AFREF aimed to build at least oneGPS station in every countrythat meets the standards of,and registered with theInternational GNSS Service(IGS). Once completed andfully implemented, it willconsist of a network ofcontinuous permanentGPS stations such thata user anywherein Africa wouldhave free accessto GPS data. Itsfull implementationwill include a unifiedvertical datum and sup-port for efforts to establish aprecise African geoid.

Current Status

Sparse continuous operating ref-erence stations (CORS) GNSSnetwork has been established andmanaged by some member States, IGSand other partners. Data from the estab-lished CORS is already being received bythe Hartebeesthoek Radio AstronomyObservatory data centre in South Africaand by IGS. While the Windhoek Declara-tion envisaged that the stations would beowned and managed by national authori-ties, it also recognised that some countriesmight need various forms of assistance toinstall and/or operate the stations.Responding to the call for support, Leicaand Trimble donated three and five refer-ence stations respectively.

Road Ahead

The initial years of AFREF were spent indemonstration phase where installation,operation, data dissemination and analysiscapabilities are understood. This phase hasended in 2007 and the project has nowmoved into the implementation phase.

With the targets well ahead and thework progressing at a slow pace, thesteering committee has taken upseveral initiatives like organising reg-

ular in-person meetings, partners'forum, experts' implementa-

tion symposia and poli-cymakers' workshopsfor effective coordina-tion and implementa-

tion of the project.

Another importantaspect of theAFREF project ismaking the raw

data from the stationsavailable to the designat-

ed computing centres andthereafter making the dataproducts available to theusers. To enable this, thesteering committee is work-

ing on a data sharing policy.

Potential

Once, realised, AFREF has vastutility in geodesy, mapping, sur-veying, geoinformation, naturalhazards mitigation, earth sciences,etc. Its implementation will provide

a major springboard for the transferand enhancement of skills and

knowledge in surveying, geodesy andespecially GNSS with its applications,paving way for the overall cooperation anddevelopment of the continent. Further, thisfundamental reference system canincrease the understanding of complexearth science systems and assist andfacilitate in solving regional and globalproblems.

AFREF AFREF AFREF AFREF AFREF AFREF

Furthering a

common cause

July 2009 GIS DEVELOPMENT 33

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The Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for

Development (RCMRD) is an inter-governmen-

tal organisation established under the auspices of

UN Economic Commission of Africa (ECA) and the

African Union. With 15 contracting member States in

the Eastern and Southern Africa, the Centre promotes

the development and application of geoinformation and

IT through institutional capacity building and human

resources assistance for the sustainable development of

Africa.The Centre is organised into three functional divi-

sions - Remote Sensing, Geoinformation and Environ-

mental Management Programme; Survey, Mapping and

Land Information; and human resources development.

The activities of Remote Sensing, Geoinformation and

Environmental Management Department include envi-

ronmental data archiving, maintaining early warning sys-

tems for food security, environmental monitoring, collect-

ing, compiling and utilising remote sensing data for envi-

ronmental assessment, providing support to remote sens-

ing and GIS sections in member States, undertaking

research in environmental assessment and management

in the member States, providing services in environmen-

tal impact assessment (EIA) in member States; providing

training in geoinformation technologies to member

States’ nationals. The Surveys Mapping & Land Informa-

tion Systems Department carries out data management

and project implementation ensuring that maps and oth-

er surveying data is of high quality and standards for plan-

ning. The Human Resources Division focuses on capacity

building initiatives of the Centre in the fields of ICT,

GIS, RS and surveying and mapping as well as applica-

tions of geomatic technologies. To enable its mission,

RCMRD uses innovative ways to reach out to the needs

of the member states - Botswana, Camoros, Ethiopia,

Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Nambia, Somalia,

South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda and

Zambia. To this effect, the functional programmes of

RCMRD have moved away from the conventional service

technology framework like remote sensing geodesy and

cartography to develop problem-solving applications in

natural resources and environmental management.

Active Partner

Over the past twenty-five years, significant developments

have taken place in the technology and methodology of

data gathering, processing, storage and dissemination of

natural resources, environmental and development infor-

mation. The member States have acquired or are in the

process of acquiring the advanced technologies for which

the Centre provides initiation and support, thus playing

the role of an active partner in the development rather

than a passive service centre, in line with the 'Centre's

2020 vision'.

To better facilitate this activity, the centre has restruc-

tured itself and revamped its objectives.

Consultancy and R&D

RCMRD has been providing consultancy services for the

RCMRD

Together as one

34 July 2009GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 34: Global July 09

'Uptake of spatial tech is slowbut promising'

You being the champion of geospatialtechnology in the continent, can youtell us the status of thiss technology inthe continent?Geospatial technology is developing fast.It is a new technology for many institu-tions in Africa. But it is being taken upand used more and more now. GIS isalso being adapted very quickly, not onlyby mapping institutions but by many oth-er institutions that deal with environ-ment, natural resources, infrastructureetc. The technology of geographicalinformation is also being used widelyoutside the traditional mapping institu-tions. Positioning technologies are alsobeing used but not as much as we wouldhave wished.

There seems to be a vast disparityamong African countries. While somecountries are advanced in terrms ofusage of this technology like SouthAfrica, some North African countriesare lagging behind. BBeing a regionalorganisation promoting this technolo-gy, how is RCMRD trying to bridgethis gap?One of RCMRD's mandates, as a regionalinstitution dealing with surveying andmapping, is capacity building. We providetraining to surveying and mapping organi-sations' staff, to improve their skills. Inother words, our training aims at transfer-ring the modern and newer technologiesto these institutions. Our training coursesare short termed, focussed, provide prac-tical skill enhancement so that the sur-veying and mapping institutions, naturalresource institutions and environmentinstitutions can improve the way they domapping. The other part of the equationis funding. Some countries in fact havetrained technical staff but lack funding tobuy GPS, all the software and hardwareetc.

You will find this situation prevailing evenin government-run mapping institutionsas political governments have not reallybeen convinced about the importance ofthese institutions to be modernised. Theydo not understand that mapping is thebasis for all development. We have notbeen successful in convincing Africangovernments so far about the need tofund and give thrust to mapping activi-ties. The problem is that there are not

always immediate benefits from mappingwhich politicians, decisions makers andeconomists expect and so they fail toconnect to mapping.

African countries do not have basiclarge scale maps. With this back-ground, how do you see SDIs shhapingup in the continent? RCMRD hasbeen actively pursuing the cause ofSDI. What is it doing to ovvercome thehurdles?We have several parallel initiatives in thisdirection. We have an initiative for fun-damental data sets that is the basis forSDI. It is true that Africa is not mappedas much as other continents to thescales that are required for planning anddevelopment purposes. So this is an ini-tiative to improve mapping at suitablescales and is ongoing under the MappingAfrica for Africa and the FundamentalDatasets Working Group of UNAC. Atthe same time, there are countriesthat have good data of parts of theircountries. This data is either notaccessible or not being used. Thisis an initiative that we support andpromote but it has been veryslow. The major problem againhas been the policies thatrequire standards and moreimportantly the willingness ofmapping organisations to cooper-ate to setup SDIs. The idea is tobring the maps of different insti-tutes to one place so that the usercan have access or at least knowthat they can find the data in thisone-stop-shop. If data is locked upin government offices and citizenscannot make use of whatever little isavailable, there is no point in producingit in the first place.In Africa, differentmapping exercises are undertaken fordifferent projects. A road project surveysand maps a specific region for its ownpurposes. There might be a waterand sanitation project andthey carry out anothersurvey and mappingexercise withoutknowing probablyfive years earlieror three year ear-lier another onehas been done.To stop this kindof duplication ofefforts and touse resourceswisely, SDI isimportant forcountriesdespite beingunder

mapped. We have to ensure that there isno duplication of already mapped areas.We, as a regional center, have held work-shops and trainings to sensitise govern-ments to establish SDIs. A number ofcountries now are on that path.Advanced countries like South Africahave passed legislations and now puttingin institutional frameworks. Countrieslike Kenya, Malawi, Ethiopia are also atvarious stages of progress.

What are the major initiatives ofRCMRD?Apart from our regional mandate wherewe have 15 member States who are con-tributing to RCMRD, we also are involvedin continental initiatives along with other

partners like UNECA.AFREF or

African

35

Dr Hussein O. Farah

Director General, Regional Centre for Mapping of Resourcesfor Development (RCMRD), Kenya

GIS DEVELOPMENTJuly 2009

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GIS DEVELOPMENT36

Geodetic Reference Frame is an initiativeunder the Committee on DevelopmentInformation (CODI) and that was startedin 2003. The idea has been around forlong and we were selected by the CODIcommittee to hold the position of theAFREF Steering Committee. Our role isto coordinate the AFREF initiatives rightfrom the start and document how geo-detic reference in Africa should be mod-ernised and made uniform. Our biggestcontribution is to train the staff requiredto set up geodetic reference, run it anddo the computations. We have been con-ducting technical trainings for four yearsnot only to our member States but to allAfrican countries.

The SERVIR project was started inNovember 2008. This is an initiative tomake spatial data accessible to Africanscientists and researchers. Internationalorganisations like FAO and UNEP pro-duce lot of data under various themes.SERVIR initiative tries to bring datatogether on a Web data portal where peo-ple can get access to mapping data.

Using Web-based visualisation,some of this map data or satel-lite imageries could be madeavailable. This is somethingsimilar to Google Earth. Theother objective of SERVIR proj-ect is to raise awareness ofresearchers and scientists inAfrica of the possible applica-tions of satellite imageries andmaps. There are 3-4 importantareas where satellite images or

maps can be used extensively in Africa.

How do you see this industry andtechnology growing in this region inthe next five years?I expect rapid changes because mappingis one discipline that is being trans-formed by technology very fast. Forexample, the way we record positions tomake a map. Until recently, many coun-tries were still using the old method ofmapping with a tape and theodolite,which is time consuming and inefficient.Today, a GPS makes things easy. Thistechnology is expected to be taken upmore quickly in the next five years andimprove our mapping coverage. More pri-vate sector involvement in Africa isexpected because mapping is nowbecoming easier - right from the fieldwork to the actual product of the map -the chain of production has become verysimple and quite automated. More andmore players will come into the sceneand I see this as a positive thing as wedon't need to depend entirely on national

mapping agencies or government to pro-duce maps. For example, private compa-nies are producing street maps in Kenyawhich can be loaded on mobile phonesor on car navigation systems. Already,the ministry of health and ministry ofeducation in Kenya are using GIS andlocation based maps for planning, something that they were not doing a fewyears ago. The demand will come fromcitizens as they want to know where theyare in the city, direction of where theywant to go in another part of the city, allsuch information on their mobile phones.

But that does not mean national mapping institutions will be irrelevant. I see a role for them in that high skillwould be required in building high quali-ty basic maps which the private sector ora location service provider can't. This isa chance for national mapping agenciesbecause the demand for basic maps willgrow higher as the private sector comesin. We all are aware of how OrdnanceSurvey has made profits because thedemands of the private sector to get thebasic maps and the willingness to pay forit. The problem in Africa has been thatdemand for basic maps is not there. But that situation is changing. With theadvent of mobile technology, telecomcompanies are offering more and morelocation based services to their clients.This creates more demand and putsmore pressure to produce basic maps.That's how I see the future of mapping inAfrica.

July 2009

past 33 years in different fields of geoinformation and

application. It has implemented over two hundred proj-

ects of different magnitudes across the continent. RCM-

RD is now providing service on demand. RCMRD is now

moving into the future with confidence and endeavours

to live up to its values of upholding the highest standards

of services to its customers and continuously improving

the quality of services and products.

The Centre offers several courses in geoinformation and

IT. The courses last between one week to three months,

and are offered throughout the year. The Centre also

offers tailor-made courses to suit the specific needs of cor-

porate clients. Courses are also offered at a location of the

client's convenience. In providing the consultancy servic-

es, the Centre often teams up with partner institutions

and the private sector. The Centre has a full fledged

research and development capacity. It conducts R&D

activities in collaboration with partners. The Centre in

collaboration with European Space Agency (ESA) and

EUMETSAT has established a facility for direct satellite

reception for MERIS, MODIS, NOAA and EUMETSAT

second generation Metosat data.

Champion

Apart from consultancy and capacity building exercises,

RCMRD is active in advocating for the development,

utilisation and spread of geospatial knowledge. It has

been spearheading the cause of ‘Mapping Africa for

Africa’ through initiatives like determination of funda-

mental datasets, AFREF and SERVIR. The Centre has

been working closely with professional bodies, govern-

ments, multi-lateral agencies and UN bodies to create

awareness. In sync with the popular African reggae musi-

cian Lucky Dube’s song, “We have got to come together

as one,” RCMRD is all out to bring in the member states

geospatially together!!

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Trimble® ®

Page 37: Global July 09

In 2003, the US President's Emer-

gency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEP-

FAR) was launched to combat

global HIV/AIDS - the largest com-

mitment by any nation to combat a

single disease in history. On July 30,

2008, the United States expanded its

commitment authorising up to $ 48

billion over a period of five years to

combat global HIV/AIDS, tuberculo-

sis and malaria. Through 2013, PEP-

FAR plans to work in partnership

with host nations to support treat-

ment for at least three million people,

prevention of 12 million new infections;

and care for 12 million people, including

five million orphans and vulnerable chil-

dren. To meet these goals and build

sustainable local capacity, PEPFAR

will support training of at least

140,000 new health care workers in

HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment

and care. PEPFAR is implemented by

seven US government agencies.

The public health sector is increas-

ingly turning to the use of GIS to

improve HIV/AIDS programme

monitoring, evaluation and planning.

HIV/AIDS epidemic is characterised

by enormous geographic variation,

PEPFAR in HIV/AIDS care

GIS DEVELOPMENT38 July 2009

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Training to combat

Dorina Maris

[email protected]

John Spencer

James Stewart

MEASURE EvaluationAndrew Inglis

MEASURE DHS

Nathan Heard

support contractor to the U.S.Department of State's Humanitarian Information Unit

Page 38: Global July 09

with striking sub-national, national and continental dif-

ferences in the distribution of HIV prevalence and densi-

ties of those who are infected. Since sub-Saharan Africa

remains the most heavily affected region, PEPFAR focus-

es most of its efforts in this part of the world, with servic-

es provided not only in facilities, but often at the commu-

nity level (Figure 1).

Mapping and spatial analysis help decision makers and

programme managers visualise relationships that might

be hidden or otherwise hard to understand in tables or

charts. Among the many challenges GIS can help address

are measuring geographic coverage of HIV/AIDS services;

locating orphans, vulnerable children and critical popula-

tions; coordinating activities across multiple sectors and

actors; and evaluating programme implementation.

In an effort to encourage data-driven decision making

across sectors and programmatic areas, beginning in 2005,

PEPFAR started placing special emphasis on strengthen-

ing GIS capabilities on the African continent through the

support of development of key spatial data layers, geospa-

tial tools, and capacity building. PEPFAR programmes

continue to work with African ministries of health,

national AIDS coordinating agencies, NMAs and others

to increase the use of geographic data and develop deci-

sion support tools that incorporate mapping. To provide a

sample of PEPFAR’s GIS work, a few select examples

implemented through USAID are highlighted below.

Improving data infrastructure –

OVC mapping

Substantial effort in the capture, formatting and organisa-

tion of data is usually required prior to mapping. As a

result, the process of map generation can help identify

critical data gaps and provide a framework within which

data from different sources may be integrated to answer

programmatically important questions. For example, to

improve health services to orphans and vulnerable chil-

dren (OVC) affected by HIV/AIDS, the Office of the US

Global AIDS Coordinator (S/GAC) and USAID enlisted

MEASURE Evaluation to assess the data available for

mapping OVC activities and to produce maps that would

assist in decision-making processes. Twelve countries par-

ticipated in the effort, 10 of which were in Africa:

Botswana, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Namib-

ia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. The

OVC mapping activity was executed in two phases: data

evaluation and mapping.

In the data assessment phase, MEASURE Evaluation

analysed the availability and quality of data for OVC map-

ping purposes. For every country that provided mappable

data, maps were produced. In those cases where the data

could not be mapped, an evaluation document was pro-

duced that provided guidance on why the data could not

be mapped and where possible, offered suggestions on

how to improve the data. MEASURE Evaluation then

Fig. 1 Continuum of Care

GIS DEVELOPMENTJuly 2009 39

Page 39: Global July 09

worked with key decision makers in selected countries to

improve data collection system and explore ways that the

data could be used to create maps showing OVC popula-

tions as well as health facilities and aid services that could

help these populations (Figure 2). A key finding of this

activity was the value of geographic data to facilitate new

linkages between OVC data with other datasets such as

those found on http://www.hivspatialdata.net/. These

linkages provide valuable context to the OVC issue and

broaden the evidence base used for decision making.

E2G tool

Because GIS technology is too costly for many to imple-

ment, MEASURE Evaluation developed the E2G the-

matic mapping tool to enable countries to map data using

the free mapping programme Google Earth. This tool

allows users with administrative-level data (e.g., percent

OVC by district) stored in Excel to produce maps of the

data in Google Earth. The Google Earth display can be

printed, saved as a JPEG file for publications, or stored in

a Web-accessible space. 13 African countries that can

currently be mapped with the tool. The E2G thematic

mapping tool is free to all users and is available on the

MEASURE Evaluation Web site.

Training and capacity building in Kenya

Quality data is the keystone for effective evidence-based

decision making. Geographic data can not only improve

the decision-making process, it can help strengthen over-

all data quality by bringing to light inconsistencies in data

that might otherwise have been overlooked. An example

from Kenya is instructive in this regard.

In June 2008, at the request of USAID, the MEASURE

DHS project organised a GIS training workshop for

provincial monitoring and evaluation staff of the PEP-

FAR-supported AIDS, Population, and Health Integrated

Assistance (APHIA II) project in Kenya. APHIA II collab-

orates with the Government of Kenya and local imple-

menting partners to expand the availability of quality, sus-

tainable, HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis prevention, treat-

ment, care and support.

The workshop aimed to train APHIA II staff to use GIS

software and link geographic coordinates to the Kenya

PEPFAR monitoring system (KePMS). Participants

learned how to query databases, conduct basic proximity

analysis and export maps for reports and presentations.

During the training, provincial teams produced maps

using their project data and presented their findings to

project leaders, gaining valuable experience in making

data accessible to key stakeholders. Following the train-

ing, teams returned to their provinces and worked on inte-

grating GIS into their monitoring and evaluation work,

leading to improvements in data quality.

Conclusion

In the long term, success is contingent upon strengthened

partnerships and coordination across sectors and among

national stakeholders engaged in mitigating the impact of

HIV/AIDS. Geography can provide a useful framework for

integrating activities, organising data and answering ques-

tions important to HIV/AIDS programme implementa-

tion. Support of national SDIs and capacity to use

geospatial technology within the health sector will ulti-

mately benefit a wide array of public health programmes

in addition to HIV/AIDS.

DISCLAIMER: The views and conclusions contained in this article are those of the authorsand do not necessarily reflect the policies of the U.S. Government. Any use of trade, product, or firm names in this article is for descriptive purposes only and does not implyendorsement by the U.S. Government.

GIS DEVELOPMENT40 July 2009

Fig. 2 Map from OVC Mapping Activity

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Page 40: Global July 09

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Page 41: Global July 09

HIV/AIDS is major public

health concern in many coun-

tries in Africa. Making sure

that people in need of HIV/AIDS care

get access to treatment in an equi-

table way requires taking several

parameters into account, making

planning decisions sometimes diffi-

cult. Geographic data and analysis is

an integral component to improve

our knowledge about equitable access

to anti-retroviral therapy (ART).

This article presents the case of

Malawi, a land locked country in

southeast Africa, and the cross-sector

collaborative process that took place

and resulted in two indicators

describing the level of coverage

offered by ART sites in 2006 as well as

the location for potential new sites.

This exercise allowed strengthening

the connections between health sec-

tors, key institutions involved in

NSDI process and other international

entities outside the country.

Introduction

Intensive efforts have been made in

recent years to increase awareness and

to prevent the spread of AIDS in

Malawi. These efforts have been rein-

forced in 2001 by the establishment

of the National AIDS Commission (NAC) and Malawi’s first National AIDS

Policy launched in 2004. Access to treatment is particularly limited in rural

areas, as problems such as a lack of transportation prevent many people from

getting access to health services. A good understanding of the geographic rela-

tionship that exists between the supply of ART and the demand among the

population is useful for decision makers to plan for the location of additional

treatment sites.

Performing such type of analysis requires taking into account conjointly the

location and the maximum coverage capacity of each ART site, the geographic

distribution of the population in need of treatment, the environment that the

patient will have to cross to reach the care provider, as well as the transportation

mode s/he would use. The geographic distribution of these parameters is gener-

ally the responsibility of different institutions. This is the case in Malawi where

the location of ART sites is collected by the National AIDS Commission

(NAC) and the Ministry of Health (MOH), the distribution of the population

WHO in Malawi

Ebener S.

Scientist, World HealthOrganisation

[email protected]

Naphini P.

Fleming P.

Kafakalawa W.

Kondowe O.D.

Makwiza I.

Manda K.

Mzembe J.

Moyo C.

GIS DEVELOPMENT42 July 2009

Page 42: Global July 09

by the National Statistical Office (NSO), the roads and

other topographical features by the National Road

Authority (NRA) and the Survey Department.

These institutions do not necessarily work together, but

have been brought together in the context of a joint proj-

ect by the World Health Organization (WHO), REACH

Trust Malawi and the Southern African Network on Equi-

ty in Health (EQUINET) aiming at promoting an equity

and health systems approach towards treatment access

and responses to HIV and AIDS in Southern Africa [1].

Challenges at the start of project

When the project started in 2006, the major challenges

playing against a systemic analysis of the level of access to

HIV/AIDS care were linked to the fact that dispersed man-

dates and capacities among various stakeholders, limited or

even a lack of communication and/or working relations

between institutions producing health data and/or geographic

information of interest in public health (MOH, NAC, NGOs,

Survey Department, National Statistical Office (NSO),…), non-

participation of several stakeholders in the development of

NSDI. For example, the MOH, lack of agreed upon data collec-

tion standards and protocols, different coding schemes were

used without being linked together, lack of awareness about

data resources and GIS skills available in the country and com-

petition for funding. This was resulting in duplication of

datasets of questionable quality as well as an important

number of lost opportunities.

Addressing the challenges, leveraging the existing capac-

ity and data at disposal as well as improving the working

July 2009

Collaborate to reach out Collaborate to reach out

43GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 43: Global July 09

connection between stakeholders would not only benefit

each of them but also ensure the compatibility and quali-

ty of the data necessary to take decisions. The opportuni-

ty to work on some of these issues came from the "Pro-

moting equity and a health systems approach towards

treatment access and responses to HIV and AIDS in

Southern Africa: a joint project for WHO, REACH Trust

Malawi / Southern African network on Equity in Health

(EQUINET)" project. The GIS capacity and data avail-

ability assessment conducted, combined with the techni-

cal resources at disposal allowed going beyond the needs

of the original project and to propose a different collabo-

rative approach.

Results of Collaboration

The collaborative work concentrated on improvement of

4 GIS layers, namely the distribution of population, the

geographic location of the health facilities, the road net-

work, the river network. With WHO’s support, the differ-

ent data sources identified have been compiled, cleaned

and homogenised using satellite images as ground refer-

ence.The improved dataset has then been combined with

cover, a DEM as well as some survey and prevalence data

to form the input data for the application of the Access-

Mod extension for ArcView 3.x [2,3].

This extension developed by WHO provides users with

the capacity to measure physical accessibility to health

care, estimate geographical coverage (a combination of

availability and accessibility coverage) of an existing

health facility network, complement the existing network

in the context of a scaling up exercise or to provide infor-

mation for cost effectiveness analysis when no informa-

tion about the existing network is available.

In the case of Malawi, the application of AccessMod

resulted in two indicators. The first one presented in Fig-

ure 2 compares the spatial distribution of the travel time

to the nearest ART site for the all prevalence population

using AccessMod (red line) with the travel time reported

by ART patients in the context of patient exit survey

(blue line). The analysis of the comparison between the

two lines provide important information regarding popu-

lation behaviour (i.e. by passing) as well as the maximum

travel time that most patients accept to travel (3 hours)

The second one estimates the spatial distribution of the

prevalence population not covered by the ART site net-

work in place in 2006. This analysis demonstrates that

scaling up treatment sites should mainly take place in the

Southern and Central parts of the country despite the

fact that these are the regions where a higher density of

ART sites is already observed (Fig 3). The approach used

should be applied to other services in and beyond health.

Conclusion

It is important to build NSDIs to solve real problems (e.g

access to HIV/AIDS care) and only indirectly technical

problems. NSDI should involve policy makers, donors and

researchers to ensure that their data assist programmes

produce societal benefits. The project presented here

illustrates the benefits that might result from a collabora-

tive effort using this driver.. The work accomplished so far

in Malawi does nevertheless only represent a first step

towards a sustainable NSDI. For the moment, the collab-

oration remains mainly facilitated by external partners

and needs to learn from other experiences as well as find

resources to become sustainable.

GIS DEVELOPMENT44 July 2009

Fig. 2 Percentage of total considered population according to travel time

Fig. 3 Distribution of the prevalence population not covered by the existing ART sites(blue cross)

Page 44: Global July 09
Page 45: Global July 09

South Africa has always been

more progressive than other

African countries in terms of

use of ICT. In 1980s, South Africa

was characterised by a general lack of

awareness in national and provincial

governmental departments regarding

what spatial data was available as

well as what capabilities GIS offered

in practice. This lack of awareness

has since dissipated, in part, through

the provision of a mandate in the

1990s to the State institutions such

as the Chief Directorate: Surveys and

Mapping and the Chief Surveyor-

General of South Africa. These insti-

tutions were tasked with driving the

growth and development of GIS in

South Africa and currently play a

vital role in providing a basic geospa-

tial framework for data.

The availability of large-scale popu-

lation datasets and the proliferation

of open source desktop mapping sys-

tems in the 1990s have resulted in

GIS becoming a fast growing indus-

try in South Africa. The technology is

currently being harnessed by govern-

Anamika Das

Sr. Manager - Conferences GIS [email protected]

GIS DEVELOPMENT July 200946

South Africa

The availability of large-scale datasets andthe proliferation of opensource desktop mappingsystems in the 1990shave resulted in GISbecoming a fast growingindustry in South Africa

The availability of large-scale datasets andthe proliferation of opensource desktop mappingsystems in the 1990shave resulted in GISbecoming a fast growingindustry in South Africa

Page 46: Global July 09

July 2009

ment, semi-private institutions and the private sec-

tor for research, planning as well as business

purposes. The application of GIS technolo-

gy in South Africa has provided the coun-

try with a crucial link to developments

in the region.

Local Government

The use of GIS in local government in

South Africa has risen tremendously

in recent years. Municipalities in

South Africa are a division of local

government and form the lowest level

of democratically elected government

structures in the country. The Munic-

ipal Demarcation Board (MDB) is

legally responsible for the drawing of

(outer) municipal boundaries and

municipal ward boundaries. It uses

GIS technology in policy and analyti-

cal work and map production. It has

embarked on several GIS initiatives

aimed at improving the quality of spa-

tial data and participating in pro-

grammes to facilitate data sharing.

The City of Ekurhuleni Municipali-

ty identified GIS as an important tool

to address and analyse in detail the

condition of the province and its peo-

ple with respect to addressing service

delivery in the province relating to

water, sanitation, waste removal and

electricity. “The long term objective

of the Ekurhuleni Municipality is to

have Internet mapping viewer and CRM system at previ-

ously disadvantaged areas” says Morena wa Letšosa,

Director Geoinformatics, City of Ekurhuleni Municipali-

ty. Most municipalities in South Africa are using GIS to

address issues relating to development planning, disaster

management, local economic development, tourism,

housing and infrastructure. In a nutshell, GIS has enabled

municipalities to effectively quantify basic needs and pri-

oritise service delivery.

The City of Cape Town integrated a GIS into its infor-

mation system infrastructure. While GIS technology was

used throughout the various local councils prior to the

amalgamation, it functioned primarily as stand-alone sys-

tems with little standardisation and limited compatibility.

To reform this legacy, Cape Town implemented an enter-

prise GIS. This allowed extensive functionality within a

multi-user environment and provided an effective spatial

data management platform for its users. “Initially, the city

concentrated on consolidating electricity and property

geodatabases into the GIS, and subsequently added the

water services geodatabase to the GIS process,” reveled

Russell Hope, Manager - Corporate GIS, City of Cape

Town. Since then, a number of other departments like

Planning and Valuations, have started implementing GIS

technology.

However, many of the developments in GIS are taking

place in a strategic and tactical vacuum because the

implementation in many municipalities in South Africa,

is failing. The outcome has been that GIS is not optimal-

ly utilised in local government and the benefits of invest-

ing in it are not being fully realised. One of the main rea-

sons why the implementation of GIS has failed in local

government has to do with how it was introduced and

how the municipality embraced it in the first place. The

development of GIS in most, if not all municipalities in

South Africa came about through the influence of a proj-

ect that required the use of GIS as a tool for capturing,

manipulating, analysing and presenting spatial informa-

tion. The shortage of GIS professionals and funding is a

key obstacle to the successful implementation of GIS in

local government.

Disaster Management

Implementation of integrated IT in disaster management

in South Africa began in 1998, the ‘El Nino year’. The

weather pattern that year was unusual. The Ministry of

the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry instructed

experts from the Strategic Planning Directorate to use IT

One of the main reasons why the implementation of GIS has failed in local govern-ment has to do with how it was introduced and how themunicipality embraced it in the first place.

47GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 47: Global July 09

for the management of rainfall, river flow and flood. The

National Disaster Management Centre (NDMC) of

South Africa (at that time Y2K Centre) took up the task.

The idea was to monitor and register potential hazards as

early as possible and to increase lead warning time.

This is one of the main activities at the NDMC main

observation room, where there is continuous monitoring

of various hazards. In January 2003, the president of

South Africa signed the South African Disaster Manage-

ment Act, a backbone of national disaster management

legislation.

The main focus is on prevention, which represents a 180-

degree turn from historically inherited post-disaster man-

agement activity; the Act highlights the role of informa-

tion as the most significant driver. GIS systems play an

important role in the set-up of the system at NDMC.

Awareness of the importance of visual information led to

GIS being considered a very significant component for

interactive communication.

The main disaster management activity at national and

provincial levels is coordination, which has, in general,

two equally important components: temporal and spatial.

The temporal component assumes coordination as a con-

tinuous activity. Improvement in the coordination of haz-

ard, vulnerability and risk-related activities requires

improved understanding of complex mechanisms and

interaction between ‘mother nature’, society and technol-

ogy. The spatial component has three main directions of

coordination: horizontal, vertical and thematic.

Horizontally, coordination as part of the national frame-

work and activities involves bringing together national,

provincial and district institutions and organisations that

run programmes in support of disaster reduction like Gov-

ernment Departments of Water Affairs and Forestry, Agri-

culture, Environmental Affairs and Tourism, South

African Weather Services, South African Police Service,

National Defence Force, Non-Governmental Organisa-

tions (NGOs), public and private institutions and busi-

nesses and educational institutions. Vertically, coordina-

tion occurs among the province, district, metropolis and

municipality.

Frequent disasters with attendant damage have height-

ened climate change related environmental and social

vulnerability, emphasising the need for tools to support

disaster management. The National Disaster Hazard and

Vulnerability Atlas has been developed using Web-

enabled GIS as the primary user interface. Twelve hazards

are listed at the Atlas website but not all of these are

equally present over South African territory. The most

dominant natural hazards are forest fire, floods and

droughts.

Frequent disasters with attendant damage have heightened climate changerelated environmental andsocial vulnerability, emphasis-ing the need for tools to support disaster management

48 July 2009GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 48: Global July 09

Agriculture

The management and protection of agricultural land has

increasingly become important, viewed against the back-

ground of food security and sustained management of the

country’s natural resources. “This cannot be done with-

out the use of spatial information due to the complexity

in utilising the information as a basis for decision mak-

ing,” commented Anneliza Collett from the Department

of Agriculture. During the early developmental years of

GIS in late nineties, the National Department of Agricul-

ture, the Agricultural Research Council (ARC) as well as

the nine provincial Departments of Agriculture have

expressed the need to work towards a common goal, espe-

cially when working with spatial information. This initia-

tive has lead to the development of the Agricultural Geo-

referenced Information System (AGIS) - a Web based

spatial information system that mainly focuses on serving

spatial natural resource information to the broader pub-

lic, free of charge. Within AGIS a land use management

system has been developed that currently manages all

applications pertaining to the sub-division and change of

land use. The system, called AgriLand, allows for online

capturing of detail information pertaining to the applica-

tion, the relevant farm portion as well as the progress in

terms of the application process. Due to the fact, the sys-

tem is located within the AGIS environment, it also

allows the applicant to determine the status of the agri-

cultural resources relevant to the involved land parcel.

This data layers form the basis in evaluating the applica-

tion pertaining to its agricultural potential and surround-

ing land use. To date, the AGIS website has strived to be

the “single source of the truth” in assisting in the man-

agement of the mentioned. However, what is required is

the continued updating of natural resource data and the

refinement thereof. All role-players involved in this field

should commit themselves in making available relevant

spatial data that will assist in the expanding of the coun-

try’s natural resource base. Continued research also forms

an important factor in ensuring that the best possible

decisions are taken pertaining to the management and

utilisation of agricultural land.

Power

The South African government has set a target of univer-

sal access to basic electricity by the year 2012. Eskom Dis-

tribution, in conjunction with local municipalities, is

responsible for electrification, predominantly in rural

areas.Eskom devised a National Emergency Response

plan to manage both the demand and supply side of the

energy crisis. Load shedding is one of the features of this

plan. According to Eskom, "Shortages on the electricity

system unbalance the network, which can cause it to col-

lapse. By rotating the load in a planned and controlled

manner, the system remains stable. Eskom uses GIS tech-

nology to manage the network." To generate the load

shedding schedules, Eskom personnel query the database

by entering an attribute or a number of attributes. The

database creates a result in a table. The GIS technology

enables the Eskom personnel to determine the shortest

path for an electricity network extension, locate under-

ground pipes and cables, balance the load, plan mainte-

nance, track energy use and track faults.

For complete article, check

http://www.gisdevelopment.net/magazine/global/2009/july/46.htm

GIS DEVELOPMENT 49July 2009

Page 49: Global July 09

INTERVIEW

GIS DEVELOPMENT50 July 2009

Tell us about Data World's products andservicesAs a group, we provide a wide range of geospatial services,mostly to public sector organisations. We have done a workin land information systems for municipal/local govern-ments. We work around property tax valuation and apprais-al system, from the ground to building to land registry,integrating it into some of our products. We have lot ofdomain expertise in South Africa where we have workedwith many premier organisations. A lot of times we findthat customers have lot of spatial data but they do notknow how to utilise it in their organisation. We try to inte-grate their business data, attribute data with spatial dataand present it in a fashion they can use it. We build toolsand have search engine type of facilities for bespoke serv-ices. We used ESRI platform in the past for this purposebut now we are building Buffalo, an open source platform.One of the areas that we have been trying to focus ishuman technology because we believe the future of com-puting is based on human technologies and writing tech-

nologies. Leopard is a tool people use to design the digitalpaper products, utilise digital pen capabilities and processthat information and integrate it with back end system.Simply put, it is the tool that allows you to write and asyou write gets converted into digital form and you canrecall what you have written. This is mobile based anduses GSM, GPRS or WAP networks to transfer data back,converts it to a copy of the document you have completedas well as a text document (html file) which people candownload into their databases. This can be used for multi-ple purposes. In our case, we are using it in the darkestparts of Africa where there is no electricity, no computers.This is being used for disease control and disease monitor-ing in a UN based project for FAO. We have cut down theinformation collection at the national offices from threemonths to three minutes. Its biggest benefit is that onecan date stamp, put the location and if you are using thelocation technology in conjunction with that, we can takethe GPS coordinates directly from the field where you col-lect the information. Document transfer and documentmanagement get very easy with Leopard.

'We make GIS acceptable

by increasing usability'

Willy GovenderGroup CEO, Data World

Page 50: Global July 09

July 2009

Most of the Data World's clients are of public sector organisations. Do you find any specific challenges to convince and sell this technology to government organisations? If you look at our biggest projects in South Africa, we are successful largely because of our ability to think out of the boxand make things work quickly and efficiently. In South Africa,technology adoption is high. This is purely because the demandfor services is first world but the supply in terms of skills is thirdworld so the gap is bridged by technology. Technology is veryempowering and enabling agent here. Government is looking fortechnology solutions because they don't have people.

Being a strong South African company, can you tell us what brought you to India?We have been doing business with lot of Indian companies forthe past six years. We have been participating in South AfricanIndian CEOs forum, and we get to see lot of Indian companiesinvesting in South Africa and those from South African countriescoming to India looking for joint venture operations. We wantedto do something different. We had the capability and the skilland that's how we set our feet in our first office in Gurgaon. Thefruits of that experience has made us expand. As the group isexpanding, we want to make India our hub for expanding intoAsia and Middle East.

What is your perception about Indiangeospatial market?A: I think it is large and focussed, more as a BPO in the pastand has never been inward looking. The only company that Iknow as a business organisation that has done any thing innova-tive around the business is Reliance. From this perspective,there is still a lot of opportunity. There is lot of information thatwe need to collect to data manage anything and it's not aboutinformation system. It's about data. We look at India in twoaspects. One is to service. Secondly and more importantly, welook at penetrating into Indian market in the niche areas, indomains we are already in. The developmental challenges inIndia and South Africa are pretty similar. On that count, wehave lot of experience.

You have said that India has been a sort ofBPO to world geospatial market. But it isstrong in that. What is the USP of Data Worldthat can enable it stand to its contenders?Indian market is price sensitive. The two barriers that preventthe uptake of any technology are cost and technology. We aretrying to bridge both these barriers with our products. Buffalo isbuilt on open source technology. With this, we have overcomethe licensing barrier. We built a platform around open sourcewhich is as easy and simple as any other proprietary GIS solu-tion and at the same time more affordable. This removed theprice barrier. Our aim is to increase the overall GIS acceptabilityby increasing usability. We can deliver solutions to larger masseswithout the need of much technical knowledge. GIS is viewed asa decision making tool but most people use it as a map makingtool. We want to enable people to start making decisions, especially in the developing world, where the need is most.

Page 51: Global July 09

As a boy Scout, I developed

immense interest in maps. I

was born and brought up in

South Africa but spent a large part of

my childhood in Swaziland. My

interest in maps took me to surveying

eventually. I did my Bachelor of Sci-

ence in Surveying from the Universi-

ty of Natal in Durban and registered

myself as a professional land surveyor

in 1979. In the 30 years of my service,

I was fortunate to have worked in a

variety of challenging environs that

gave me a lot of opportunities in pro-

duction, research, planning and

problem solving. Initially, I had good

exposure in photogrammetry, remote

sensing and cartography but not

First Person

Dr Derek Clarke

Chief Director: Surveys and MappingDepartment of Rural Development and Land Reform, South Africa

GIS DEVELOPMENT52

As a land sur-veyor or as thehead of GSDI,Dr DerekClarke’s heartbeats for thegeodetical unifi-cation of Africa

Boy Scout to surveyor

of world repute

July 2009

Page 52: Global July 09

much in GIS. I got myself involved in a digital mapping

project in 1982 and that’s when my interest in GIS devel-

oped. This led to the initiation of the National Exchange

for Geo-referenced Information Standard Project in 1985.

There were several constraints in terms of the inability to

exchange data due to lack of standards and limitations of

proprietary systems. We realised not all organisations are

using the same language. So, it took lot of efforts to edu-

cate the people. Though we completed the project in

1986-87, the project didn’t match our expectations when

it came to the implementation of it owing to proprietary

software being used. Several leading GIS software compa-

nies competed with each other to capture the market

share. I agree competition is there even today, but they

tend to listen to users and are quite adaptable.

In 1989, South Africa initiated its efforts to build the

national land information system (NLIS), a forerunner to

national SDI. I was chosen to drive the programme. The

main objective of the programme was to improve on the

existing standards, try and coordinate the happenings in

the public sector so that duplication is minimised, to

encourage government departments to be custodians of

their datasets, make them accept their responsibility of

sharing. In 1997, it was decided to restructure the NLIS

into the National Spatial Data Infrastructure to be

aligned with international trends. In 1993, I was promot-

ed to the director of mapping and in 1997 to the Chief

Director of Surveys and Mapping (head of the national

geodetic surveying and mapping organisation). My new

role is more of managerial and programme management

rather than production. During that time, I did masters

degree in public administration in 1995 and achieved my

Ph.D in 2007.

Teaching to fish

In 1997, we structured the national SDI. There after, the

department started a new component and unfortunately

since then I have not had direct responsibility for South

Africa’s national SDI. But I hope that this situation will

change in the near future. My organisation has been one

of the major data custodians – geospatial data creators

and maintainers. Obviously we all have a great role to play

in the national SDI. In early 2000, the approach then was

to encourage people to participate, collaborate and coop-

erate. This wasn’t working. In late 2004, a new legislation

for the national SDI was drafted, which created a 40-

agency coordinating body to look into the issues of policy,

to ensure that duplication is minimised, standards are set

and maintained and very importantly to try and create

metadata.

Ultimately, SDIs need to be taken to the community

level. It should be made participatory. If we don’t look at

these societal issues, it would be too inward looking,

alienating the people, to whom we are supposed to cater

to. It is important to involve them as well. You know the

old Chinese proverb – give a man a fish and you feed him

for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for life.

That is the situation we have today. As people, as a coun-

try, we have to learn. There are people to take us to a par-

ticular level but after that you have to empower yourself

to grow on your own.

Africa Unite

The committee on Information Development (CODI),

now CODIST, meets every two years where African coun-

tries report on the progress they have achieved since the

last meeting. At the end, they make some resolutions.

They are meant for the African govern-

ments to implement the recom-

mendations and make

progress. But I noticed that

these conferences make

very nice resolutions but

the next time you

attend these confer-

ences, there is no

progress. African coun-

tries are reporting no or

minimal progress. I, per-

sonally, became disillu-

sioned of this inaction. I

felt we ought to have some-

thing more concrete and so I

put forward the concept of the

Mapping Africa for Africa ini-

tiative. That was in 2003.

It was fortunate

that the ICA

endorsed it

followed by

CODI in

2004. It

became

an essen-

tial part

of

July 2009 53GIS DEVELOPMENT

Page 53: Global July 09

GIS DEVELOPMENT

CODI-Geo and they created a working group on funda-

mental datasets and the whole initiative came to be called

Mapping Africa for Africa. I have been driving this initia-

tive since 2003 trying to make a difference in Africa. One

of the reasons why this is close to my heart is that it has

been hard seeing my colleagues in other countries talking

and complaining without progress being made. South

Africa cannot work in isolation as a country. We need to

work in association with our neighbours. Otherwise, there

will be a flood of economic refugees into South Africa. It

will be a tremendous burden on the country’s public serv-

ices. Instead, if we work together, assist and support each

other, development will be more uniform in the region.

I acknowledge that it is the responsibility of the technol-

ogist to educate the decision makers at the highest level

for some tangible action. We can see the need for what we

are doing but we are unable to put it in a language that a

politician can understand.

Africa and beyond

I served as the president of GSDI in 2000-01. One of the

main reasons for me to be part of such an organisation is

to have international collaborations so that we can learn

from each other, share information and also when we look

at our country and region, we also need to look at the

world as well. We are also contributing to the Global Map

Project, to create a global dataset, which is being spon-

sored by the Japanese government. I am also serving as a

Vice-president of ICA. This is with an intention to net-

work internationally, particularly with developing coun-

tries. We don’t have the human resources, technology

know-how or the financial capabilities developed nations

have. But it is important

to use the resources at

hand optimally. So I

observe what the devel-

oped nations do correct-

ly and what went wrong,

so that we don’t make

the same mistakes.

Greater meaning

to life

I have had good support

from my family all

through. I realised life

has greater meaning

than just work and you

ought to have a balance. You just can’t be a technocrat,

you can’t immerse yourself in work. You have to look after

your body as well, without which you cannot perform. I

have one daughter from my first marriage, working as a

freelance illustrator and is a budding author. I am father

of three-year-old twins from my second marriage. To be a

father at this age is quite a change and enjoyable. When

you are a father, you certainly see things very differently

and I am more mature now. I am currently training as a

professional integral coach, which is immensely develop-

ing me as a person. I hope that I can use my coaching to

make a difference to the lives of those that I coach.

Long way to go

I still feel there is a lot for me to do in the organisation, a

lot to do and a lot to live for. We are just finishing the

redesign of our data model. We re-designed a fully inte-

grated topographical information system, which is the

heart of the organisation. We integrated various databas-

es, fully structured and integrated GIS and made it fea-

ture rich. But now we have to take it even further. We are

in the process of redefining the standards across the

organisation. I am also quite passionate about people

development. I believe in empowering people to have

choice. Everyone is an individual and maintain dignity in

their work. I don’t like to impose myself on others. I give

direction and guide. I follow coach and approach policy.

Unless they go critically wrong, I listen to people and go

with their recommendations and decisions. But yes, I am

capable of saying no as well. At the end of the day, if I can

make a difference to a person, a community, I feel I am

worthy and I have done my bit.

July 2009

With Santiago Borrero (Columbia) in the centre and Jack Dangermond (ESRI) at a dinner during GSDI-5 conference

54

Page 54: Global July 09

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Page 55: Global July 09

he 11th edition of the annual Global Spa-tial Data Infrastructure (GSDI) conferenceopened in Rotterdam on the 15th of June.The theme of this year’s conference was

Spatial Data Infrastructure Convergence: BuildingSDI Bridges to Address Global Challenges. Theopening day saw a series of workshops on topicsrelating to SDI.

The morning workshop discussed the ‘Legal Issuesof Geoinformation: A short introduction to IP, Privacyand Liability’. The proceedings were conducted byDrs Colette Cuijpers and Maurice Schellekens,Assistant Professors of the Tilburg University of Law,Technology and Society. Dr. Schellekens covered theconcept of copyright as applicable to digital geospa-tial data. He closed with a discussion on free accessversus cost recovery. Dr. Cuijpers took up the issueof liabilities. Simple issues can get exacerbated dueto internationalisation. She ended with a question:How far can we pursue liability before we start hampering innovation?

The second workshop was on ‘Best Practices in SDI’by Roger Longhorne. He defined six maturity levelsbeginning with 0 (no SDI) through 1 (ad hoc SDI), 2(SDI aware), 3 (refined SDI), 4 (quantitatively managed SDI) and finally 5 where the SDI is optimised to give best service. The third workshopwas on ‘Interplay of Budgets, Accountability and SDI’ was anchored by Kate Lance, NASA and twospeakers, Sylvain Latour from NRCan and Floris deBree from Netherland Geological Survey.

The second day of GSDI 11 focused on “BuildingSDI Bridges to address Global Challenges”. Introduc-ing the theme Dr Bas Kok, President GSDI, said thatbridges need to be built between technologies andacross boundaries. Leen Hordijk, Director, Institutefor Environment and Sustainability, JRC, EuropeanCommission, stated that environmental challengeslike climate change are global but have local impact.He highlighted the importance of citizen’s participa-tion. In the second plenary, Gary Nairn, former Spe-cial Minister of State and e-Government, Australiaspoke on ‘Spatially Enabling Society through E-Gov-ernment: A Political Imperative’.

The panel was chaired by John McLaughlin, President and VC of the University of NewBrunswick and one of the founders of GSDI. Thepanellists had to respond to three questions. Whatare the three primary achievements in your region inbuilding SDI? What are the three goals to make SDImeet the societal needs of your region? What are thethree key actions or goals for enabling workingacross regions?

The third day of GSDI was the opening of the 3rdINSPIRE Conference. The conference opened withtwo keynote talks and then went on to INSPIRE specific papers. In the first keynote delivered byDenise Lievesley, Head of the School of Social Sta-tistics, King’s College, London the topic chosen was‘Information is Power: Overcoming Obstacles to DataSharing’. Pirkko Saarikivi, Managing Director, ForecaConsulting Ltd was the next speaker. She spoke onROADIDEA: Ingredients for Innovative TransportServices. In the next session on INSPIRE: Buildingthe European SDI Massimo Craglia, Director Gener-al, JRC, EC gave an overview of the INSPIRE effortsfrom conception to the present. Hugo de Groof, DGEnvironment, EC, spoke on INSPIRE in the Euro-pean Shared Environmental Information System.

The fourth day of the conference focused on nation-al issues in Geonovum and RGI Plenaries. The session was entitled “Public Sector meets Scienceand Industry”. The Mayor of Rotterdam, AhmedAboutaleb spoke on the SDI opportunities in Rotterdam after which the National Geo Register ofthe Netherlands was formally declared open.

Bart Parmet, Secretary of the Delta Commissionspoke on how a living land builds its future by working together with water. Eelco H Dykstra, Professor, International Emergency Management atthe George Washington University Institute for Crisis,Disaster and Risk Management, in his comments onthe work of the Delta Commission in an internationalperspective, delineated the roles of prevention andrecovery in disaster situations.

In the next plenary mark a keynote was delivered by Cor van Tilborg, Chairman, Space for Geo-infor-mation. He spoke about the need for a viable geo-industry, effective government and the need toconnect business, government, and research todevelop an SDI. The last plenary covered DutchTrade and Pioneer Spirit in Geo-information. Fourindustry representatives outlined their activities andfuture plans.

The last day of GSDI 11 began with the corporatesector visions and perspectives: Building Bridges toStimulate Participation. The session was organisedby the platinum sponsors: Autodesk, Cyclomedia,ESRI and EuroGeographics. Four use cases werepresented by, Greta Remy, Coordinator Traffic Safety,Belgium, Dean Paull, CEO, PSMA Australia, Berik Davies, Global and GIS Coordinator, ShellInternational Exploration and Production, Dr JosefStrobl, Professor, Centre of Geoinformatics, SalzburgUniversity.

GIS DEVELOPMENT56

GSDI-11 talks on

building bridges

Conference Report

T

July 2009

Page 56: Global July 09

Visit labs.erdas.com for a glimpse of ERDAS IMAGINE 2010. For more information on ERDAS,

please visit www.erdas.com or call +91 124 4633000.

Page 57: Global July 09

16 - 18 September, 2009

Map Africa 2009

Birchwood Hotel & O R Tambo Conference

Centre, Johannesburg, South Africa

http://mapafrica.gisdevelopment.net

27 - 28 July, 2009

GeoIntelligence 2009

Hotel Inter Continental EROS

New Delhi

www.GISdevelopment.net/geointelligence

18 - 20 August 2009

Map Asia 2009

Suntec Singapore International Convention

and Exhibition Centre, Singapore

www.mapasia.org

Singapore

Singapore

India

India

Johannesburg

Johannesburg

July 2009

21- 23 July

GEO Summit - Latin America

Sao Paulo, Brasil

www.geobr.com.br

24-26 July 2009

healthGIS2009

Hyderabad International Conven-

tion Center, Hyderabad, India

http://e-geoinfo.net/healthgis2009/

August 2009

4 - 7 August

10th South East

Asian Survey Congress

(SEASC ’09).

Bali, Indonesia

www.seasc2009.org

August 4-6, 2009

Second Circumpolar Conference

on Geospatial Sciences and

Applications

Westmark Hotel, Fairbanks, Alas-

ka, USA

http://alaska.usgs.gov/science/geography/IPY-

GeoNorth/

27 - 28 August

GISCA’09

Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan

www.aca-giscience.org/gisca09

31 August - 4 September

International Association of

Geodesy Scienific Assembly --

IAG 2009

Buenos Aires, Argentina

http://www.iag2009.com.ar/

September 2009

2 - 4 September

6th International Symposium

on LBS & TeleCartography

Nottingham, UK

www.lbs2009.org

9 - 12 September

International Symposium on

Digital Earth (ISDE)

China National Convention

Center , Beijing , China

http://www.isde6.org

13 -17 September

GITA's GIS for Oil & Gas

Conference

Houston, Texas

gita.org/events/oil_gas/09/index.asp

22 - 24 September

Intergeo

Karlsruhe, Germany

www.intergeo.de

22 - 25 September

ION GNSS 2009

Savannah, GA

http://www.ion.org/

29 Sept. - 2 October

GIS Defence Asia-Pacific

Singapore, Asia

www.gisdefence.com.sg

30 Sept. - 1 October

DGI Central & Eastern Europe

Prague, Czech Republic

www.dgicee.com

October 2009

7 - 9 October

ESRI Latin American User

Conference (LAUC)

Colombia, USA

www.procalculoprosis.com/lauc09

11 - 15 October

51st Association of Nigerian

Geographers Annual Conference

Kogi, Nigeria

www.geo-planksu.org

21 - 22 October

GEOMATICS 2009

Quebec, Canada

www.geomatics2009.comwww.GISdevelopment.net/events/index.asp

GIS DEVELOPMENT58 July 2009

M a r k Yo u r C a l e n d e r

Page 58: Global July 09

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Page 59: Global July 09

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