African Indigenous Peoples’ Workshop on effective use of GITs and ICTs in advocacy

I have just come back from Namibia where I attended the "African Indigenous Peoples’ Workshop on effective use of GITs and ICTs in advocacy" (Windhoek, 25-28 August 2008)

The workshop has been organised by the Indigenous Peoples of Africa Coordinating Committee (IPACC) with technical and financial assistance provided by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), ERMIS-Africa, Cybertracker Conservation, Shalin Ry and the Rainforest Foundation UK.

Indigenous African leaders and technology intermediaries have shared experiences on how geo-spatial information technologies (GIT) are used by indigenous peoples to express their traditional ecological knowledge to decisions makers for the purposes of securing recognition and rights. Key case studies presented included participatory mapping by ToCADI and San groups in Botswana, Participatory 3 Dimensional Modelling (P3DM) by hunter-gatherer peoples in Kenya, GPS-based mapping experiences from Cameroon, DR Congo, Namibia and South Africa.

The workshop included also capacity building sessions on the use of Cybertracker and online mapping (Google Earth and Google Maps) and web 2.0 (web2fordev) applications like blogging, online video sharing, and use of electronic discussion groups including [ppgis]).

Web 2.0 applications have been presented and adopted as adds-on to GIT in support to networking, communication, alliance building and remote collaboration for advocacy.

African Indigenous Peoples’ Workshop on effective use of ICTs in environmental advocacy

Starting on August 26, 2008 IPACC is holding a 3 day workshop outside of Windhoek Namibia for 40 indigenous African leaders to review case studies of how geo-spatial information technologies can be used by indigenous peoples to express their traditional ecological knowledge to decisions makers for the purposes of securing recognition and rights. The workshop will also look at the role of the internet (Web 2.0) in helping promote good advocacy and communication. The event is co-hosted and presented by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), the Rainforest Foundation UK, ERMIS Africa, Cybertracker Conservation and Shalin Ry.

Rebecca Moore from Google Earth Outreach, Geneva layer showcase

Rebecca Moore, Head of Google Earth Outreach, demos 2 partner layers at the launch of Google Earth Outreach in Geneva: UNHCR's refugee layer and the Elders' "Every Human Has Rights" layer.

PPGIS.net on LinkedIn to foster community development among pgis/ppgis practitioners

Since DGroups, the platform hosting [ppgis] offers limited opportunities for members to learn about each other and to e.g. get together on a country basis. Considering this limitations and the opportunities offered by emerging web 2.0 applications, I have created a parallel peer2peer space on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a social- networking site used by professionals.
Joining this new space will allow you to easily identify and establish contact with other [ppgis] members.

The goal of this new space is to help [ppgis] members:

To easily identify members of the [ppgis] network, learn more about them and eventually establish personal contact;
Accelerate careers/business through referrals from [ppgis] Group members;Put a face and a professional curriculum behind a name or an e-mail address

Here’s the link to join the new platform: http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/131362/56BA201FA389

Below is a short vide explaining how LinkedIn works: