An overview of SDI Africa
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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
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:
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
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)
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
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)
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
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
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
Challenges to the building SDI
identified by respondents (cont’d)
“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
This survey is incomplete!
There is SDI building activity in Africa,
and there is room for more