Caribbean OpenDRI2013

In collaboration with the University of the West Indies (UWI), Trinidad and Tobago, the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR) and the World Bank’s Latin America and Caribbean Region Disaster Risk Management and Urban Development (LCSDU) Unit, an Advanced Spatial Data Management Training will take place at Department of Geomatics and Land Engineering at the St. Augustine campus.

The one-week training will provide an in-depth understanding of spatial data management and aims to foster knowledge and technical skills to effectively use national and regional data management practices. This will help in integrating the GeoNode platform to manage, share, and increase the use of geospatial data to improve decision-making processes for disaster risk reduction measures in the Caribbean.

Altogether 34 participants from 10 countries (7 countries with active DRM operations) and 5 regional agencies are participating in this training which is running parallel in two tracks, one for GIS data managers and other for GIS software developers. Most of the participants are the key personnel in GIS data management activities in their respective countries/organizations. We are providing the practical hands on training which is directly useful in deploying the data management platform as well as craft the tools focused on the regional need which could help in decision making process. Innovative technologies and tools like Open Street Mapping, Inasafe (risk analysis tool), mobile data collection toolkit and integration of GeoNode with other systems are being catered to the participants so that they will continue using and enhancing these tools to bring better data management, use and analysis. This will significantly boost our effort in capacity building in the region. Beside we are engaging these two groups of participants a lot of inter-actions among themselves with the aim that they continue work together in their respective countries in enhancing existing tools or crafting a new one.

On the last day of training Saturday on Feb 23, the participants will present their work plan for deploying Open Data and tools for each country to coincide with the Global Open Data day. We invite Global Open Data Day community to join us.