The GIS Team currently provides support for all Environmental Services Program activities, with special attention to Watershed Management and Service Delivery, through the production of maps/on-demand mapping, and the provision of data development services, and partner training. The ultimate goal is to create a strong spatial planning team that can play an active advisory and planning role for all ESP technical units.
The team uses GIS applications to obtain and integrate information on the locations of critical ecosystems, people, threats, resource characteristics and markets, and produce land-use suitability maps. The program then couples these maps with economic analysis and market studies to identify sustainable “development pathways” (see Menu),
Among the services provided by the GIS Team are the following:
Services Delivery:
* Helping facilitate the collection of information on the public water utilities
* Providing Global Positioning Systems (GPS) training to the public water utilities
* Providing overview of GIS and on-the-job training for public water utilities
* Helping Services Delivery Team select water utilities to work with the GIS/MIS
* Benchmarking the current level of the public water utilities (related to water utility selection)
* Providing technical assistance
* Providing advice on maintenance and improvements
* Capacity-building on system use
Watershed Management:
* Data collection
* Carrying out analyses to determine priority watersheds
* Conducting microcatchment analysis
* Carrying out analyses on areas where rehabilitation is needed
* Capacity-building for planning board (Bappeda)
* Community mapping
* Capacity building for conservation NGOs
* Helping teams focus their work by defining the parameters for site selection and then establishing the criteria for each parameter
In the communications and evaluation area, DAI’s Internet-based capability provides a simple communication tool that will help tell the story of local conditions and project activities in eco-regions to a wide audience. ESP will compile geo-referenced data, link this to information on ESP project activities, and incorporate them in specially prepared maps on the ESP website, which can them be accessed by all concerned to coordinate or target development interventions in the eco-regions, or to share successful approaches and lessons learned.
In order to optimally support ESP’s work, the GIS Team must be able to effectively operate vector and raster GIS software; develop, implement and communicate with spatial planning tools, and monitor and report on project activities and results. To help the team do all this, two rounds of training have been provided to date (1st and 2nd stage training), with the objective being to see what is already a very strong group of mapmakers become a very strong group of spatial planners and analysts.
