Officials from the Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD) have urged institutions to harmonise the management of information on locations and shapes of geographic features and the relationships between them (spatial data), usually stored as coordinates, and topology to better contribute to national development. 

Speaking at a regional forum on National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) in Kigali on Monday, Dr Hussein Farah, the director general of RCMRD, said harmonised spatial data management plays a big role in a country’s planning.

"If you want to plan for education, agriculture and infrastructure, you need accurate information on which to base your planning. Geographical data management means a lot for economic development since we cannot develop without planning, ” he said.

Spatial data refers to all types of data objects or elements that are present in a geographical space or horizon.

It enables the global locating of individuals or devices anywhere in the world.

Dr Emmanuel Nkurunziza, the director general of Rwanda Natural Resources Authority (RNRA), which has been leading the implementation of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure, said there is need to harmonise the management of geographical data to boost development activities.

He said, currently, different institutions are using spatial data but its management is not well coordinated.

"For instance, we make different maps at RNRA, but different institutions like road development and maintenance, energy development, health institutions and others also make their maps. We need to establish a portal where all this data can be found instead of keeping it scattered in different institutions. This could enable users to get enough information for their planning,” he said.

The Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development was established in Nairobi, Kenya in 1975 by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the then Organisation of African Unity (OAU), now African Union (AU).

RCMRD is an inter-governmental organisation and currently has 20 contracting member states in the Eastern and Southern Africa.

They include Botswana, Burundi, Comoros, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somali, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Its mandate is to promote sustainable development through generation, application and dissemination of Geo-Information and allied ICT services and products among the member states and beyond.

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