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MapObjects Provides Tools to ResearchersAfrica Country Almanac Project Assists Natural Resource Management in Sub-Saharan Africa
Inspiration for the Africa Country Almanac came from a UNIX-based ArcInfo ARC Macro Language (AML) software tool called the Spatial Characterization Tool, which was also developed by the Texas group. This system allows users to select a specific site (e.g., an agricultural experimental research station), obtain climatic information about the site, and then determine areas of similarity on a continental or even cross-continental scale. Users also can determine agro-ecological zones defined by specific climatic and environmental characteristics. The challenge for the almanac project was to take these powerful characterization tools and transfer them into a stand-alone PC format (Windows 95, 98, and NT), making them accessible to a much wider (non-GIS) user group.
The Africa Country Almanac was developed for users ranging from scientists to policy makers and offers a suite of access tools and country-level data, as well as textual information, enabling researchers to explore questions such as
A parallel role for the almanac project is that of GIS awareness building. Few agricultural researchers have previous exposure to the power of GIS. Providing researchers with direct access to spatial tools through the almanac will foster an increased understanding of this potential and lead to a greater demand for more sophisticated GIS analyses. Almanacs are already being applied to real-life research issues in sub-Saharan Africa. National agricultural program scientists in Kenya and Ethiopia have used the almanac to assess the relative importance of their maize research stations in representing the target environment for which they breed. Looking at the semiarid areas in Kenya, an almost complete coverage of the target environment was achieved with site similarity maps of existing research stations.
A key feature of the Country Almanac is climate surfaces, produced by interpolating data (with a splining technique) from more than 6,000 meteorological stations throughout Africa. Various climatic models have been derived from the original long-term monthly average surfaces. These models were originally targeted to the needs of agricultural researchers, as they include models such as favorable growing season and dry season, but they have also found much wider utility--they are already being applied to health-related issues, such as predicting the spread of malaria, and livestock research. Review versions of the almanac have already been demonstrated within the region and received very favorable responses from researchers covering a broad spectrum of disciplines. Upon release in September 1999, further training workshops in the region will be carried out by the CIMMYT and Texas A&M team. Jeff White, head of the GIS/Modeling Laboratory at CIMMYT, makes the following comment: "This is an entry-level package that nonetheless offers genuine GIS capabilities and will raise researchers' awareness and expectations concerning this technology." Although the almanac project has focused initially on sub-Saharan Africa, expansion to cover other parts of the world is already taking place. Funding to create an almanac for Nepal has already been secured, and a Texas almanac is nearing completion. John Corbett, the lead scientist from the Texas A&M team, reports that production of a prototype State almanac for Texas is complete. He notes that "the vast amount of data available for Texas led to considerable tool development in the almanac that can move back to the African Country Almanac as similar data (e.g., census) becomes available." For more information, contact John Corbett (tel.: 254-770-6636, fax: 254-770-6561, E-mail: corbett@brc.tamus.edu, Web: www.brc.tamus.edu/char) or Jeff White (tel.: 650-833-6625, fax: 650-833-6626, E-mail: j.white@cgiar.org). |