Transcript An overview of SDI Africa

An overview of Spatial Data
Infrastructure in Africa
Liz Gavin
National Spatial Information Framework,
Department of Land Affairs, South Africa
Presented on behalf of Interim SDI Africa Task
Team
GSDI 4, Cape Town
15 March 2000
Preface: Contextual Observations
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Africa does not act or live in isolation from the rest of
the globe : e.g.
– signatory to agreements on Desertification,
Biodiversity...
– participation by many African countries in Global
Map
Africa made up of a large number of countries:
– the history of the continent makes acting in unison difficult
– there is great unevenness with respect to technology and
knowledge bases
– Well developed regional organisations e.g. SADC, IGAD
Preface: Contextual Observations

There is an awareness of need to be part of the
Information Society, and SDI is seen as part of
that e.g. AISI, relation between CODI & CODIGEO

Entry to the Information Society presents both
– challenges: infrastructure needs to be built
– opportunities: technological leap frogging
“An” overview:
The thing about overviews is …
there are so many overviews to choose
from!
 This one is based on a recent/currently
in progress survey :

– questionnaire developed by “Interim Task
Team for SDI Africa”
– questionnaires distributed 1999/2000
through UN/ECA and informal networks
Approach
Document projects which may be
creating a legacy of SDI components,
not only formal SDI programmes
 Questionnaire based on GSDI survey
 Attempt to probes components of SDI
without (with less) possibly alienating
jargon
 Explicitly include non-digital forms of
spatial information

Responses received (so far) (1 of 3)
More than one country involved:
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The Southern African Development Community
(SADC) Food Security Programme, based at the
Regional Remote Sensing Unit (RRSU) in Harare,
Zimbabwe
Regional Tsetse and Trypanosomosis Control
Programme (RTTCP) covering the SADC countries of
Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique and Malawi, with the
Ministry of Agriculture, Zimbabwe, as lead agency
CSIRO Forestry and Forest Products, Australia: a
global programme on tree cultivation, with some
(limited) activity in Africa
Responses received (so far) (2 of 3)

Algeria, Institut National de Cartographie et de
Teledetection

Morocco, Centre Royal de Teledetection Spatiale
(CRTS)

Ethiopia, Environmental Support Project
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
Seychelles, The Seychelles GIS Centre
Kenya, Kenya wetlands conservation and training
programme

Uganda, The Biomass Programme of Uganda
Responses received (so far) (3 of 3)
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Swaziland, Surveyor General’s Department
Botswana, Department of Surveys and Mapping
Namibia, Surveyor-General
Namibia, National Remote Sensing Centre (Ministry of
Environment and Tourism)
Lesotho, Committee for Environmental Data
Management
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Lesotho, Chief Surveyor’s Office

South Africa, National Spatial Information Framework
Typical SDI components

Creation of base / framework / fundamental
data sets:
– all respondents quote work in this area
– several cite more than one agency developing
digital data set

Metadata collection and availability
– range of responses
– two digital catalogues reported (SA-NSIF, Ethiopia)
Typical SDI components (cont’d)
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Standards development and alignment:
– range of responses

Framing of policy pertaining to dissemination
and access:
– range of responses

Capacity building
– mentioned explicitly in 3 responses
Dissemination of spatial data
Data producer or custodian generally
responsible for dissemination: would-be users
make direct contact with producers
 Digital data provided on CD-ROM
 Hard copy mentioned in most responses

Technology Aspects

Most respondents indicate that they intend (8) or are
already using a web-site (4) for disseminating
information and/or spatial data
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Survey meta-information:
– 3 responses faxed
– 1 response posted (from near by!)
– the remaining responses received by e-mail
Technology Aspects

Telephone main lines per 100 inhabitants in subSaharan Africa:
– 0.4 in 1990
– 0.5 in 1995
(derived from ITU database, quoted by Mansell and Wehn in
“Knowledge Societies, Information Technology for
Sustainable Development” )
Liaison / linkages
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Botswana is involved in Global Map
RRSU in Harare has linkages with GSDI (TWG) and
SA-NSIF
Lesotho’s CEDAMA and Seychelles have links with SANSIF
The RTTCP works with the RRSU
Ethiopian project: links to organisations in the
Netherlands and ANZLIC
Seychelles has links with Middle East initiatives
Challenges to the building SDI
identified by respondents

Lack of resources
– Financial
– Human
Lack of clear policy framework
 Lack of standardization
 Constraints due to technology
infrastructure
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Challenges to the building SDI
identified by respondents (cont’d)
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“Soft” (i.e. harder to deal with) issues:
– lack of (culture of) co-operation between
institutions
– attitudes towards data and information
access
– lack of understanding of need for SDI by
decision makers
– insufficient support of SDI building by
senior managers in government
Concluding remarks
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This survey is incomplete!

There is SDI building activity in Africa,
and there is room for more