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Advances In SDI Development In Africa Dozie Ezigbalike Senior Geographic Information Systems Office Development Information Services Division (DISD) United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Abstract This paper will discuss efforts towards developing spatial data infrastructures at the national level in Africa. The presentation will highlight the activities of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and in particular, of its Committee on Development Information (CODI). The activities of ECA in this area have been in collaboration with several partners. The presentation will discuss the benefits to the region of working in such partnership. The presentation will conclude by focusing on an SDI implementation guide being developed by ECA and its major partners. Introduction The diversity of African countries seems to be reflected in the advances made towards developing spatial data infrastructures. The countries are at various stages. Most of the developments have been in response to identified needs for information, but the majority have been in response to the needs of managing the environment. The paper first looks at the developments of data sharing and management systems resulting from the EIS activities. Then the experiences of countries that have started the initiative to improve land information management are exemplified. The paper highlights efforts at continental coordination, the work of ECA and CODI-Geo. Prelude to Spatial Data Infrastructures in Africa Efforts to manage spatial information for the benefit of the wider community of users have been going on before the concept of SDI was formally introduced or adopted at the national levels, especially in the surveying and mapping and environmental management communities. Governments have long recognized the need for relevant spatial data in order to manage land resources. This recognition grew out of the land information management programmes of the 1980s. Those programmes were seen as extensions of the mandates of cadastral offices, which were usually associated with national mapping agencies or ministries/departments of land affairs. By the time the multipurpose cadastre concept evolved from land information systems, African governments were still grappling with implementing computerized land information systems. However, they embraced the MPC concept and started thinking of multi-user information resources. Great effort was applied to determining “user needs” in order to be more responsive to them. The Internet was not yet invented. So dissemination was conceived in the form data dumps being sent to user departments on portable storage media, such as magnetic tapes. No operational system was ever completed, especially given the poor access to computer resources in Africa, which only improved in the late 90s. Towards Cross-Institutional National Coordination The environmental management community has long recognised the role of compatible information resources for their work. In Africa, a program of Environmental Information Systems in Sub-Saharan Africa (EIS-SSA) was established to support a “continent wide series of National Environmental Action Plans (NEAPs)” which started in the late 1980s to early 1990s in response to the challenges of striking a balance between economic development and sustainable: The aim was to help Sub-Saharan Africa countries create operational Environmental Information Systems which meet priority demands of resources users, planners, and decision makers for a better renewable resources management (Bassolé 2000 qtd in ECA 2001). The original context of the EIS programme focussed mainly on using GIS technology to provide adequate data for the NEAPs. However, early experience in implementing them brought out the importance of “establishing An appropriate institutional framework to facilitate the generation of environmental data sets.” The strategic orientation document of EIS-Africa therefore defines EIS as: … a coordination of actions aiming at allowing for a spread use of environmental information in decision making in the framework of sustainable development. It entails an institutional framework, a network of spatial data management facilities, and data/information policies for making environmental data and information accessible and easily used by individuals and decision/policy makers for national, sub-regional, continental or global needs (Bassolé 2000). The procedure adopted by the EIS programme included seeking out and harmonising available data sets and developing capacity to use them in environmental decision-making. It also included developing partnerships with organisations having similar objectives. Even though the term SDI was not used, the programme applied SDI principles and attempted to provide a broad range of spatial data services, not just to the environment community, but also to other potential users of the products and services. The EIS programme became a precursor to formal SDI initiatives, like the National Framework for Geo-Spatial Information Management (NAFGIM). From EIS to SDI – NAFGIM The National Environment Action Plan of Ghana was to be implemented by the Ghana Environmental Resource Management Project (GERMP). It soon became evident, as was the case in several African countries, that adequate data products were not available in digital form for the project. It therefore led to the development of the Environmental Information System Development project (EISD). This became a major initiative and it was realised at the onset that some of the data sets needed already exists, and that what is needed is to strengthen the institutions involved in the collection, processing and analysis of the required land-related information. The Government of Ghana, World Bank and the Danish International Development Agency funded the project, which developed capacity in the application of GIS and related technologies to the management of land-related information in five institutions namely, Remote sensing Applications Unit, University of Ghana Legon, Survey Department, Lands Commission, Soil Research Institute, and the Meteorological Services Department. As the project proceeded, the participating institutions discussed the establishment of formal mechanisms to coordinate the production and harmonisation of their spatial data products. The result was the establishment of NAFGIM. In order to ensure the compatibility of the data sets, the work of NAFGIM includes standardisation, and to enhance the exchange and sharing of data, the need for metadata was also emphasised and included in their work. The implementation of NAFGIM started in April 2000 with secretariat at the Environment Protection Agency. The Secretariat comprises a secretary, technical staff and a Coordinator. A Steering Committee constitutes the policy-making body, while an Inter-Agency Forum provides professional watchdog functions. NAFGIM works through technical workgroups that deal with broad thematic areas. The implementation approach envisages sensitization of the institutions, consensus building, capacity development and operationalization.  NAFGIM has evolved to become the de facto SDI of Ghana with objectives to co-ordinate the development of the necessary conditions for:
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