contentMain FeaturesAudit Disaster Related Aid 2Agricultural Geospatial Commons 5

Education newsReal-Time Online Learning 8Refresher Courses 2009 10

Research newsTsunami: Tragedy and Truth 10Satellites and Sensor Database 12

Partnership newsExternal Cooperation Window 13GEONETCast at RCMRD 14UNAM 15

AnnouncementsTravel Grant AfricaGIS 2009 18RS of Soil Salinization 18

EventsLand Governance SupportingMDG 19Urban Students Meet 20Capacity Building in DGIM 24

Staff newsWelcome / Leaving 21

Life after ITCITC Alumnus VP ASPRS 25Alumni Meet in Laos and

Cambodia 25News from a Participant 27

Staff newsInaugural Address Georgiadou 27Inaugural Address Zevenbergen 28

1ITC News 2009-1

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2009number 1

What’s real? … and what’s virtually real? Philosophers would probably have afield day with those questions. Still, there’s no doubt that advancing technol-ogy is providing us with ways and means of spanning time and space thatwould have amazed our predecessors. On page 8 you can read all aboutITC’s experiences with Elluminate, a product that provides a real-time virtualclassroom room environment for distance education. And if the article whetsyour appetite - which it most surely will - you can satisfy your curiosity furtherby registering for free live online training at the internet address provided.

Unfortunately, the realities of our physical world sometimes lead totragedies of stark proportions. The horrific tsunami of 2004 is a case inpoint. But was this a unique event? One PhD student has explored the his-tory and evolution of the coastline in part of the ravaged area and uncov-ered some remarkable information in this respect (see page 10). These find-ings may well contribute to the design of appropriate coastal protection inthe future. The tsunami is also a focal point of the article on page 2, whichexamines the use of GIS and remote sensing in auditing disaster-related aid -more specifically in auditing houses and other buildings constructed for thevictims of this giant tidal wave. One challenging task within the context ofremote sensing is the selection of sound data. Never one to back away froma challenge, ITC has developed a database to provide rapid access to timelyinformation about earth observation satellites and sensors. Sounds interest-ing? Check out page 12 for more details.

Pages 15 and 16 plot the path of the joint research strategy that has led toan important framework agreement with the Universidad NacionalAutonoma de México. In the last five years, ITC has concluded no less than18 joint research framework agreements, a fact that serves to underline thesignificant scientific contribution of the ITC graduate student community.

So plenty to get your teeth into in the latest edition of ITC News. It comes incolourful hard copy and handy digital form, but whether you’re thumbingor clicking your way through its pages, I trust you’ll find much to claim yourattention - naturally, in between polishing up those well-known ITC skills atthe dartboard, snooker table and suchlike (page 22-23).

Virtually yours, Janneke Kalf Jorien TerlouwManaging Editor Editor

introduction

Managing Editor: Janneke KalfEditor: Jorien Terlouw

Editing: Janice CollinsDesign&PrePress: Henk Scharrenborg

(Composer DTP service)Printing: PlantijnCasparie Zwolle

Correspondence to: Managing EditorITC NEWSP.O.Box 6

7500 AA EnschedePhone: +31 (0)53 487 44 11Fax: +31 (0)53 487 45 54E-mail: itcnews@itc.nl

colofonITC NEWS is published quarterly, by ITC, Enschede, the Netherlands

The views expressed by the contributors do not necessarily reflect those of ITC

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The project Use of

Geographical

Information System

for Audit of

Disaster-Related Aid

- part of the

programme

Strengthening

Accountability for

and Audit of

Disaster-Related Aid

- resulted from the

vision of the

International

Organization of

Supreme Audit

Institutions

(INTOSAI).

The project was initiated by Egbert Jongsma,project manager of the INTOSAI TsunamiTask Force of the Netherlands Court ofAudit, and B. Dwita Pradana, acting head ofPublic Relations and Foreign Affairs of BadanPemeriksa Keuangan RI (BPK), theIndonesian Supreme Audit Institute. TheWorld Bank funded the project.

In its effort to minimise waste, competition,fraud and corruption within the aid fund,the INTOSAI task force suggested an auditusing geographical information. With re-mote sensing and GIS, those areas wherethe risk of the misuse of funds is highest canbe identified, thus focusing the audit effortand saving the time and money of theSupreme Audit Institution in charge.Indonesia (and in particular Aceh after the2004 tsunami disaster) was selected as apilot area for the use of GIS for audit pur-poses. The project had three main compo-nents: method development, feasibility andtraining.

Method and TrainingThe method focuses on auditing houses andother buildings that have been constructedfor the victims of the 2004 tsunami. Once amethod has been developed for houses, itshould be relatively easy to include infra-structure and agriculture as well. The basicidea behind the method is to use two mapsof the objects of interest - one of the origi-nal situation and one of the new - and de-tect the changes by applying overlay tech-niques and rules for change detection inorder to obtain only the changes of interest.

The resulting changes are combined with amap of administrative units. Resulting mapsand/or tables are compared with the infor-mation supplied by the institution being au-dited, and this procedure is followed by(field) sampling. The map would usually bederived from satellite images or aerial photo-graphs. This could be the generic approachfor all spatial objects under audit, such asforests, houses, agriculture and environmen-tal impact.

It is useful to analyse satellite images and ex-isting data before the field survey, becauseGIS can help in the planning of sample sitesand routing. Knowing the area of a housingproject and its history and having the avail-able data to hand in the field make it easierfor the field team to focus on the missingdata and select the sites for checking.

Suitable remote sensing methods were de-veloped to detect houses on the KOMPSAT-2(Korean Multipurpose Satellite) imagery sup-plied pro bono for this project by the KoreanAerospace Research Institute (KARI). Theproject delineations of the field teams weredigitised and combined with the map ofnew houses. In this way, thematic (audit)data of the housing projects could be relatedto the new houses mapped from the im-agery.

During analysis, displaying all field data on amap and combining these data with thegeo-database can make it easier and fasterthan when using a table with numbers to as-certain exactly where, for example, the

GIS and Remote Sensingfor Audit of

Disaster-Related AidWietske Bijker bijker@itc.nlHartanto Sanjaya hartantosanjaya@gmail.comEgbert Jongsma e.jongsma@rekenkamer.nlTom Loran loran@itc.nl

3ITC News 2009-1

M A I N F E A T U R E S

houses are unfinished. From these data, wecan also analyse the sites and area wherethe contractor works and compare themwith the administrative boundary (village),revealing overlaps in working area. Reportsare easier to understand if we can include agood map of the spatial distribution of thecharacteristics of interest.

For BPK, the fundamental question was notsimply whether houses had been built asplanned but also whether these houses wereindeed occupied by their new owners. Onthe KOMPSAT-2 images, it is impossible tosee whether a house is occupied. We ex-plored the possibility of a combination withaddress databases of services such as waterand electricity, but without success becauseof a lack of reliable and complete data.

Over a period of 10 days, training was givento 10 people from several units of BPKJakarta and from the BPK AcehRepresentation Office. The objective was tofamiliarise BPK staff with the method of GIS-based housing audit as developed in theproject. The training was held in Banda Aceh

so a field visit could be part of the training.Participants came from different professionalbackgrounds, mostly related to accountingor economics. Several participants had al-ready followed a basic GIS training course.

Following requests from BPK to acquaintstaff from other branches of the organisa-tion with the use of GIS and remote sensing,we presented an executive seminar in theBPK office in Jakarta.

Feasibility and ConclusionsBased on our experience, we can now saythat GIS is a useful and cost-effective tech-nology for preparing and planning an auditsurvey, for visualising where risk of fraud ishighest, and for limiting the amount of datathat has to be collected in the field. Remotesensing can be used to acquire spatial datathat are not yet available as maps, and alsoallows independent verification of certainobjects and processes.

Furthermore, having the data to hand in amobile GIS in the field and storing the dataimmediately in digital form speeds up the

Over a period of 10 days, training was given to 10 people from several units of BPK Jakarta and from the BPK Aceh RepresentationOffice

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M A I N F E A T U R E S

survey and reduces the risk of error, and pos-sibly the number of samples needed too.When it comes to presenting the results ofthe audit, maps are very effective for sum-marising information and showing spatial re-lations.

Training BPK field staff in two to three weeksto use the technology for basic applicationsis feasible. However, further support shouldbe organised, for example, via a central unitwith GIS/remote sensing professionals thatcould assist local units and develop or adaptmethods where needed.Data accuracy and methods to assess the ac-curacy of spatial data still deserve more at-tention. As with all data used by an audit in-stitute, the reliability of the data used in theaudit is important to ensure the credibility ofthe audit and the confidence of the generalpublic.

Results from the project have been incorpo-rated in Chapter 5 of GIS and AuditingDisaster-Related Aid, the report of the INTO-SAI Tsunami Task Force on the lessons learnt(see http://eca.europa.eu/portal/page/ portal/intosai-aada/productdetails?p_item_id=1182128 under “GIS and audit”). BPK is cur-rently using GIS and remote sensing in itsaudit of forestry management in Kalimantan,

while the Netherlands Court of Audit isusing geo-information in an increasing num-ber of their projects.

We thank Karola Rentenaar, audit managerForeign Affairs and Defense Audit Division ofthe Netherlands Court of Audit, BPK’s AcehRepresentative Office, Yakob Ishadamy andRichard Kidd from BRR–SIM-C (SpatialInformation and Mapping Centre of theCentre for Rehabilitation and Reconstructionof Aceh and Nias), BAKOSURTANALGeospatial Unit and KARI for their contribu-tions to the project.

The method focuses on auditing houses and other buildings that havebeen constructed for the victims of the 2004 tsunami

The basic idea behind the method is to use two maps of the objects ofinterest - one of the original situation and one of the new - and detectthe changes by applying overlay techniques and rules for change detec-tion in order to obtain only the changes of interest

Under the

administrative

supervision of the

Consultative Group

on International

Agricultural

Research (CGIAR),

the large American

engineering firm

CH2M HILL is

partnering with the

ITC departments

Geo-information

Processing and

Natural Resources to

deliver the geospa -

tial technology pro -

gramme Agricul -

tural Geospatial

Commons

(AGCommons).

The programme aims to support the devel-opment of sub-Saharan agriculture throughmaking location-specific information avail-able to farmers, farmer communities and or-ganisations, and other planners and decisionmakers in the agro-product value chain.Initial funding for the programme is beingprovided by the Bill and Melinda GatesFoundation.

Outreach in West AfricaOur small outreach team visited Mali,Burkina Faso and Ghana in the last twoweeks of March for an intensive series of vis-its to farming stakeholders, ranging fromlocal farmers to regionally operating researchinstitutes. Through ITC’s alumni network, weidentified a local contact in each country forlogistical support, as well as contacts in thevisited organisations. Our team for WestAfrica was in the capable hands of Louisevan Leeuwen. In Burkina Faso, she receivedon-the-ground support from alumnus JeanSemporé; in Mali from Sibiry Traoré(ICRISAT); and in Ghana from Djate Andrews(CERSGIS). Jennifer Barnes and Todd Slindon behalf of CH2M HILL completed theAGCommons team, with expert help re-ceived from Kai Sonder (CIAT) and Dr JideKufoniye, well-known in the ITC community.The purpose of the effort was to elicit infor-mation needs, assess opportunities forgeospatial enablement, and make a start onbuilding a user community for AGCommons.The scene of action then shifted to Nairobi.

CSI Annual EventThe annual meeting of the CGIARConsortium for Spatial Information (CSI),which this year also served as a consultationregarding the AGCommons programme,was held from 31 March to 4 April. It

opened on Tuesday with the CSI businessmeeting, during which the group set out thestrategy and actions for the coming year.The group was addressed by Dr JohnMcDermott, who encouraged the CSI tocontinue as a model of collaboration for theCGIAR as it undergoes structural changes.Dr Bashir Jama provided an overview ofAGRA’s programmes and challenged the CSIto think strategically about the contributionsspatial technologies can make towards de-velopment in the next five to 10 years. TheCSI and AGCommons were further chal-lenged to work closely with Africa-led devel-opment efforts and to strengthen capacitiesof national institutions with respect togeospatial technology and its applications.

Much of the day’s work was carried outthrough a World Café discussion of issuesand opportunities. This resulted, amongother things, in a set of proposals that in-cluded the establishing of an outreach com-mittee to start a CSI geospatial blog and re-vitalise CSI’s web assets; the creating of acouncil to assist the global coordinator inachieving the CSI work plan for the comingyear; and the setting up of a thematic data

5ITC News 2009-1

M A I N F E A T U R E S

CSI/AGCommons AfricaGeospatial Week

Todd Slind todd.slind@ch2m.comRolf A. de By deby@itc.nl

World Café discussions on selection criteria for upcoming projects in the AGCommons programme

task force to investigate efficiencies andidentify best practices with respect to cli-mate data management and analysis.

Wednesday brought Spatial Solutions Dayand another packed agenda. Each CGIARCSI representative reported on the currentgeospatial research activities of their respec-tive centre. In addition, presentations weremade by Google on MapMaker, USAID onthe SERVIR-Africa initiative, ReSAKSS on itsknowledge management and collaborationwith CAADP, and on the Great LakesCassava Initiative with its field data collec-tion technology evaluation and deployment.Highlights were many and various, and de-tails of each presentation were blogged liveby the group via Twitter.

AGCommons Day began with an introduc-tion to the programme by Srikant Vasan,senior programme officer with the Bill andMelinda Gates Foundation, and EnricaPorcari, AGCommons programme coordina-tor and CIO of the CGIAR. This was followedby a report on the preliminary results of theWest Africa outreach efforts mentionedabove, a presentation of the five quick winprojects currently getting underway, a dis-cussion of some of the potential approachesto an AGCommons technical platform, anda description of what AGCommons seeks inits implementation, technology, business anddonor partners. The majority of the after-noon was used to generate ideas concerningcritical aspects of the AGCommons pro-gramme, again in World Café format.

Discussions were lively and carried the groupwell past the scheduled close of the day’sagenda.

Friday started with a report from the previ-ous afternoon’s World Café and a presenta-tion from the Regional Center for Mappingof Resources for Development, a partner inSERVIR-Africa and a provider of data prod-ucts, geospatial tools, and capacity buildingservices. Friday afternoon began with alivelink presentation from Chris Nicholas onhis AssessmentGRID concept. The rest of theday focused on the work resulting fromAGCommons Day and on confirming the CSIwork plan for the coming year. The groupwas split into two topic groups to discuss: • thematic areas in which AGCommons

should provide services • platform requirements to technically sup-

port the provision of these services.These discussions resulted in a matrix offunctional service areas that will be targetedat potential customers, and a short list ofservice opportunity scenarios that will beevaluated for their technical requirementswith respect to both existing providers whohave the capability to address gaps, andareas where AGCommons needs to act todefine and implement a technical solution orcapability.

By Friday afternoon, most of the participantswere mentally and physically exhausted.Much had been discussed and much hadbeen accomplished over the four days.Furthermore, it was heartening to witnessthe mounting interest of the Kenyan pressover this period.

WhereCampAfrica The inaugural WhereCampAfrica was atremendous success on the Saturday, with100 or so participants discussing many as-pects of geospatial technologies as well ascross-fertilising with social media and cul-tural topics. This stimulating and lively event,which offered opportunities for communitybuilding, rounded off a hugely successfulAfrican Geospatial Week.

Outreach in East AfricaAt the time of writing, we have a farm-freshoutreach team in the field again, this timevisiting stakeholders in Kenya, Uganda and

6 ITC News 2009-1

M A I N F E A T U R E S

The AGCommons World Café during CSI week

Rwanda over a two-week period. Onceagain, the ITC alumni network provides uswith extremely valuable connections in manycases. The key ITC organiser is ThomasGroen and he is collaborating with FatumaYusuf and Jubal Harpster (both CH2M HILL),and An Notenbaert (ILRI). Our on-the-ground officers this time round are DavidNkedianye (Kenya), Albert Mugenyi(Uganda) and Adrie Mukashema (Rwanda).By the time this East African team has fin-ished, we expect to have acquired a thor-ough understanding of the geospatial po-tential for African agriculture. This will form

the basis of phase 2 of the programme,which is expected to start in the second halfof 2009.

AGCommons is not only a geospatial tech-nology distribution scheme, it is also astrong attempt to build a community of indi-viduals and organisations with a vested in-terest in helping to improve sub-Saharanagriculture. Interested readers are advised tovisit www.agcommons.org or contact one ofthe authors from the CH2M HILL/ITC part-nership.

7

M A I N F E A T U R E S

The AGCommons West Africa outreach team lookingat TIPCEE (Trade and Invest Program for CompetitiveExport Economy) maps and posters

A Burkinabé farmer telling us about her fields andcrops

Jubal Harpster (also known as Mr WhereCamp) ex-plaining the principles of the Camps

Madame Lydia of the Farmers Organisation Networkin Ghana (FONG) at the Accra AGCommons mini-workshop

ITC News 2009-1

Students from the 2008 distancecourse Spatial Decision Support Sys-tems have experienced a new ofway of distance learning by attend-ing Elluminate classes. They couldinteract live with one another andwith the lecturers in a highly collab-orative and engaging way.

Distance courses offered by ITC are agood way for alumni to broaden theircapabilities in specific fields. Withouttravelling to ITC, students can followa compact course on current topicssuch as GIS data quality or environ-mental impact assessment. But offer-ing high-quality distance courses re-quires particularly appropriate anduseful tools for communication andcollaboration between students andlecturers.

Recently, Johannes Flacke and LucBoerboom used Elluminate in theirdistance course Spatial DecisionSupport Systems. Elluminate is a real-time virtual classroom that allows liveinteraction yet requires a relativelylow bandwidth - sometimes essentialfor distance students. Linlin Pei fromthe E-Learning Support Unit inter-viewed Johannes regarding their ex-perience with this new way of teach-ing, and some interesting points aredealt with below.

What are the differences betweendelivering a distance course withand without Elluminate?Well, we mainly gave the same dis-tance course we’d given the last twoyears, but then we added three livesessions using Elluminate. These threesessions were scheduled at crucialpoints throughout the course: 10

days after the start to resolve anypossible problems during the initialphase; at the end of the most impor-tant lesson of the course, to makesure that everything had been under-stood; and just before the final exam,to clarify final questions.

Do students like this way of learn-ing? Any feedback?The feedback we got right after thesessions was highly positive. The stu-dents very much liked the way ofcommunicating with us and with oneanother directly, and made good useof it. And I can say it also helped meto get a better understanding ofsome issues that were bothering thestudents during the course.

What are your thoughts as re-gards adding Elluminate sessionsto distance education? Are yougoing to use it in the future?We’re still learning how best to incor-porate Elluminate into the course, but

we will definitely use it again nextyear. Most important from my pointof view is the fact that you can use itstrategically throughout the course atcrucial points. Then it really addsvalue. For example, when having asession, it helps to bring the class to-gether again by defining milestonesthat have to be reached by a certaintime. I found out that it even stimu-lates the students to work harder af-terwards, whereas they were not veryactive before. What’s more, you canalso record the session, which meansit will be available afterwards on theElluminate server. This is quite helpful.For instance, if someone misses thesession or the connection fails, he canlook at it at a later date.

How does Elluminate encouragestudents and instructors to inter-act?It’s almost as if you were in a normalclassroom situation: you can give alecture using slides, only the students

8 ITC News 2009-1

E D U C A T I O N N E W S

education news

Real-Time Online Learning: An Elluminate Virtual Classroom

Linlin Pei pei@itc.nl

Johannes Flacke flacke@itc.nl

Teaching at a distance using Elluminate

are not sitting right in front of you,just your computer screen. The stu-dents can hear your voice and watcha PowerPoint presentation. You canalso show them how to use an appli-cation running on your computer,even handing over the desktop con-trol to one of them. When a studenthas a question or wants to commenton something, he can click on an iconto raise his hand. I can hear this onmy headset, so then I hand the mi-crophone over to him and he can puthis question to the class.

Is it easy to use?During the first session, I gave a 15-minute introduction to the basicfunctionalities of Elluminate. Afterthat, the students were able to usesuch basic functions as the chat tool,the audio tool, voting, and raisingtheir hands. In the following sessions,it only took five minutes’ preparationat the beginning before we couldstart with the virtual class again. Ofcourse, using advanced functionalitiessuch as application sharing or build-ing subgroups to work on a specifictask in so-called break-out roomswould require more training.

To log on to a session is also quitesimple. The students get a weblink in-vitation via e-mail and have to clickon it. The Java applet is automaticallyinstalled on their computer. I wouldsay it takes five minutes to get into asession, without first being registeredor any other preparatory procedures.

What differentiates Elluminate’stools from free chatting and videoconferencing tools such as MSN orSkype? Well, the main difference is that youcan combine a variety of tools andmultiple ways of communication inone virtual class. You have the white-board, where you can upload slidesstraight from PowerPoint for teachinga topic, or you can write down a ques-tion asking the students to react. Nextto it, you have the participants’ win-dow, which you can use to monitorthe class: here you can see if some-one is raising a question, you can askthe students for feedback, or you canlet them vote. Finally, you can use thechat tool to communicate with an in-dividual student who has forgotten toturn off his microphone. You can alsopost a private message to studentsworking in break-out rooms.

Where are your students located?Do they have bandwidth issues?This time we had students from Africa(Egypt and Tanzania), as well as fromLatin America and South America(Brazil, Guatemala, Jamaica,Colombia). As far as Latin Americawas concerned, it worked very well -almost no delay in the voice stream.With the students from Africa, how-ever, we did sometimes have prob-lems in understanding their voicestream - but at least they could all un-derstand us quite well throughout thewhole session, and could clearly seethe slides shown on the whiteboard.

Of course, the speed of internet ac-cess is the critical factor here. Wefound that dial-up connections with115 k, for example, didn’t work well,but with a standard cable or DSL con-nection, it was all but perfect. If theconnection is too poor, you shouldprobably let the students raise theirquestions via the chat tool ratherthan use the voice tool.

SummaryElluminate provides a real-time virtualclassroom that allows live interactionto be added to asynchronous dis-tance courses. It can also be used toget in touch with your MSc or PhDsupervisors or to facilitate projectmeetings without travelling. For thoseof our readers with a technical bent,some of the key features ofElluminate are: • application sharing• interactive whiteboard• multipoint video• PowerPoint import• interactive quiz and survey man-

ager• indexed recording and playback• instant messaging.

If you would like to try Elluminateyourself, you can register for free liveonline training (www.elluminate.com/support/training/index.jsp) or getyourself a free Elluminate three-per-son room (www.elluminate.com/vroom/register.go). At ITC, you cancontact the Support Unit E-learning(Linlin Pei, pei@itc.nl).

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E D U C A T I O N N E W S

It’s almost as if youwere in a normal classroom situation:you can give a lectureusing slides, only thestudents are not sittingright in front of you,just your computerscreen

Elluminate main window

Refresher courses, which are certifi-cate of attendance courses (mostlyof two-week duration) organisedfor alumni in their home countriesor regions, are meant to increasethe impact and prolong the effectof earlier training.

Refresher courses are funded mainlyby the Netherlands FellowshipProgramme (NFP). In principle, thetarget group of these courses consistsof alumni who have completed anyNFP-funded training or education atleast two years before the plannedstarting date of the relevant refreshercourse. Colleagues and supervisors ofalumni are also allowed to participatein (part of) a refresher course.

While it was widely believed thatthe huge tsunami that devastatedparts of Asia in 2004 was a uniqueevent, PhD candidate Ella Meiliandahas now uncovered information tothe contrary. In her determinationto understand the evolution of thecoastline, she began researching historical records and ancient maps,and found written evidence of amountain-like wave in the same re-gion about 700 years ago. Meilianda also discovered thatsmaller tsunamis occur as often as

every 20 to 30 years. Combined withcarbon dating of rock samples inMalaysia and other scientific studies,she has created a timeline model ofthe Banda Aceh coastline in an at-tempt to predict future changes.

Born in Banda Aceh, the capital ofSumatra, Indonesia, Meilianda won ascholarship from the Indonesian gov-ernment and came to theNetherlands to pursue her PhD stud-ies. On 26 December 2004, when thetsunami struck, she was working on

her research proposal for the inte-grated coastal zone management ofBanda Aceh for the UT’s WaterEngineering and ManagementGroup. Unable to contact her family,she returned to the region and wasgrateful to discover her parents andsister were safe. Two months later,she came back to the Netherlands.Her family home had been destroyedand, tragically, 15 of her relatives haddied and childhood friends weremissing.

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E D U C A T I O N N E W S

Refresher Courses 2009

research news

Tsunami: The Tragedy and the TruthResearcher Uncovers Valuable Information

UT News INFO@utnws.utwente.nl

In 2009 ITC will co-organise six refresher courses:

• Sustainable Economic Development and Conditions for Land AdministrationNamibia, 8 June 2009

• Impacts of Infrastructure and Transport - Modelling and Mapping for Sustain -able Infrastructure Development in an Urbanising Landscape in West AfricaGhana, 10 August 2009

• Targeting Urban Poverty AlleviationEthiopia, 14 September 2009

• Use of Low-Cost Earth Observation Data in Environmental and ClimateMonitoring Applications: Taking Further the African Union-AMESD InitiativeRwanda, 5 October 2009

• Designing and Utilising Geo-information Infrastructures for Effective ElectronicGovernance in Eastern Africa Uganda, 12 October 2009

• Innovative Approaches to Multiscale Landslide Hazard and Risk AssessmentSri Lanka, 19 October 2009

For more information and application: www.itc.nl/education/courses.aspx?prog=6

Academically, the data she had col-lected on the morphology of thecoastal system of Banda Acehseemed of limited value. Meiliandaneeded to find a new avenue of re-search. With the support of her su-pervisor, Dr Marjolein Dohmen-Janssen, and the guidance of herpromoter, Professor SuzanneHulscher, she decided to research themorphological development of theBanda Aceh coast after the tsunamion 26 December 2004. Soon aftershe began working on her new pro-posal, she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and encour-aged to take on a 50% percentworkload. Almost exactly one yearafter the tsunami, in January 2006,Meilianda defended her proposal.

She says: “I tried to stand firm.Emotionally, yes, it was difficult, butalso there were so many uncertain-ties. I was concerned about the databecause the morphology of thecoastal system was completelychanged. I began with a short timescale, using satellite images to com-pare the coast before and after thetsunami. I had images from four daysafter the event, and I kept monitoringthe coast until 2007. But I was con-cerned. Was the tsunami really an un-precedented event? Then I had toknow the whole story. So I widenedmy time scale.”

By comparing old historical topo-graphical maps from the Netherlandswith local maps, as well as ancienttexts and archaeological findingswhich recorded land subsidence,Meilianda attempted to create a linkwith the scientific evidence. Using thecarbon dating information compiledin Malaysia and the curvature of sea-level fluctuation that had occurredover the last millennium, she createda framework of the evolution of theBanda Aceh coastline. Meilianda thenchose a 100-year time scale to plotfuture scenarios. She says: “I neededto consider the intermittent forcingfactors involved in shaping thecoastal system of a tectonically unsta-ble area. Combined with a regularwave climate causing temporal ero-sion of the coast, there was the fa-mous issue of a rising sea level due toglobal warming. Yet there was also

the threat of tsunami and land subsi-dence, which often occurs after anearthquake. Both land and sea levelscould suddenly change, altering thewater depth. This would affect thewave climate and lead to a differentrate of sediment transport.”

Meilianda’s research involved theanalysis of surface changes of thecoastal plain and sea-bottom topog-raphy (bathymetry) using GIS dataprocessing at ITC, where she was su-pervised by Dr Ben Maathuis. She de-fends her PhD on 19 June, and says,“What I have accomplished in mythesis is just the beginning. I want tocontinue my research. It’s importantinformation if we want to design thecoastal protection of this area. In mymind, it all goes towards the victims.”

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Ella Meilianda says, “No coastal structurecould stop such a huge tsunami. Now it willstay in history, and we can learn from its ge-ological imprint.”

Banda Aceh, Indonesia, 2004: the 1,000-ton elec-tricity generator ship was swept 2 km inland bythe tsunami, ending up less than 500 m fromMeilianda’s parents’ house (photo: Ella Meilianda)

The ship stranded inland (ca. 3 km inland from theport) (photo taken June 2005)

The ruins of the parental home, located less than500 m from the stranded ship after the tsunami(photo taken January 2005)

Electricity generator ship docked in the port basinat Ulee lheue, Banda Aceh (photo taken in 2003, be-fore tsunami)

ITC’s sensor database has been de-signed and developed to providerapid access to up-to-date informa-tion about earth observation satel-lites and sensors. It also providestechnical information and links todata and information sources on the internet.

Selection of “good” data is a chal-lenging task within the context of re-mote sensing. Good data are ac-quired when and where theresearcher needs them and theyshould have the required spatial andspectral characteristics too. Hence,the best way to understand suitabledata with respect to the job at handis to look at the observation dimen-sions of available data, for example,spatial and temporal resolutions,spectral coverage, etc. If remote sens-ing researchers have a better under-standing of the data acquisitionprocesses and of the technologies in-volved, they might have a betterchance of selecting what they reallyneed. Moreover, basic understandingof the principles and possibilities ofdata acquisition methods and of in-struments, as well as knowledge ofwhere the researcher can go to findthe data, would be beneficial sinceone system or one satellite missioncannot provide all the informationappropriate for the user community.

The information available in the data-base itself is collected from varioussources. Priority has always beengiven to the official sources since theycan be considered more reliable. ITCtries to avoid mistakes in the data-base as much as possible but you areencouraged to signal any improve-ments required.

ITC hopes that this initiative will sup-port more and more appropriate useof remotely sensed data for earth ob-servation science.

12 ITC News 2009-1

R E S E A R C H N E W S

In order to fulfil the above require-ments, ITC’s database of earth obser-vation satellites and sensors providesa platform for harvesting what the re-searcher needs through various linksto information sources and dataarchives. This database was devel-oped this decade starting with thedata that are mostly used within ITC,and new satellites and sensors arebeing added continuously. The con-tent of the database is checked bycomparing information sources withone another, even including the valid-ity of the URLs to data and informa-tion sources.

ITC’s Database of Earth Observation Satellites and Sensors

Muditha Heenkenda sensordatabase@itc.nl, heenkenda@itc.nl

For more information, visitwww.itc.nl/research/products/sensordb/searchsat.aspx

The Erasmus Mundus External Coop-eration Window (EM ECW) is a co-operation and mobility scheme inthe area of higher education coop-eration launched by the Europe AidCooperation Office. The EM ECWobjective is to achieve better under-standing and mutual enrichmentbetween the European Union andthird countries cooperation in thefield of higher education throughpromoting the exchange of persons,knowledge and skills at higher edu-cation level. This is achievedthrough the promotion of partner-ships and institutional cooperationexchanges between Europeanhigher education institutions andthird country institutions and a mo-bility scheme addressing studentand academic exchanges.

ITC is coordinating the window forIran, Iraq and Yemen(www.erasmusmundus8.net) and forAfrica, the Caribbean and Pacific

States (www.erasmusmundus10.net),and is a partner in the window forIndia and Regional Asia.

Africa, Caribbean and Pacific WindowOn 20 and 21 January 2009, a jointprogramme board meeting tookplace in Windhoek, Namibia, hostedby the Polytechnic of Namibia, one ofthe partners in this mobility scheme.EU representatives Renata Russels andRaul Mateus Paul (head of UnitCentralised Operations, EuropeAid,ACP) and UNHCR representativeAntonius Kamerika of the Namibiafield office participated in the meet-ing. Under the ACP Window, 148students from ACP countries have re-ceived fellowships to study in Europe.

Regional AsiaThe External Cooperation Windowfor Asia (also called EMMA) has beenawarded to a consortium (headed bythe University of Nice, France) in

which ITC is a partner. The mobilityscheme to be implemented under thiswindow will start on 1 September2009. The EMMA consortium consistsof nine universities from Europe andeight universities from the AsianRegion. The Asian partner universitiesare located in Bangladesh, Cambodia,India, Pakistan and the Philippines,and the European partner universitiesare located in France, Germany,Poland, Romania, Spain, Italy, Turkeyand the Netherlands. The first pro-gramme board meeting was heldfrom 8 to 12 March in Dhaka,Bangladesh. (When you read this arti-cle, the selection of candidates forthe available EMMA fellowships willhave been concluded and mobilisa-tion will take place in the comingmonths.)

Lot 15 IndiaITC is a consortium member of theErasmus Mundus ExternalCollaboration Window (Lot 15) for

13ITC News 2009-1

P A R T N E R S H I P N E W S

partnership news

Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Windows

Lyande Eelderink eelderink@itc.nl

John Horn horn@itc.nl

Tom Loran loran@itc.nl

Mark van der Meijde vdmeijde@itc.nl

Raymond Nijmeijer nijmeijer@itc.nl

Andrew Skidmore skidmore@itc.nl

Meeting in Windhoek, Namibia Delegates during a game drive close by Windhoek

India. This comprises eight Indian and12 European universities and is coor-dinated by the University of Lund,Sweden. A full consortium meetingof all partners took place at theUniversity of Leuven in January, whenITC was appointed member of thesteering committee.

Sustainable development requirescoordinated, comprehensive andsustained Earth observations forearly warning, informed policiesand effective decision making. Insupport of this objective the Groupon Earth Observation (GEO) is lead-ing a worldwide effort to build aGlobal Earth Observation System ofSystems (GEOSS), providing Earthobservations from a multitude of in-struments worldwide. It is foreseenthat these Earth observation data(in-situ, air and space borne) andderived products are (re) distributedvia GEONETCast to a broad range ofuser communities. ThereforeGEONETCast, bringing together themany disparate sources of environ-mental information, has a signifi-cant potential to enhance access toa wide range of information to

users. This low cost, global, environ-mental information delivery systemcurrently operates the European,African, Asian and American serv-ices. The data stream transmitted bythese communication satellites canbe received using a simple andcheap ground reception infrastruc-ture. GEONETCast distributes imagesthat have been used previouslymainly by the Meteorological com-munity but which are becoming animportant data source to a wide va-riety of users that deal with environ-mental analysis.

With the ongoing development ofGEONETCast, broadcasting (globally)a multitude of satellite observationsand associated products in conjunc-tion with cheap ground receiving in-frastructure, the data is now at the

doorstep of the user community any-where in the world. Problems relatedto a limited bandwidth available inmany countries are overcome.Efficient processing and analysis rou-tines are required to facilitate incor-poration of these environmental datasources and products to improve na-tional and regional policy and (timely)decision making for a better manage-ment of the natural resources andface the challenges posed by sustain-able development. The low costground receiving segment coupled toa freeware toolbox approach is wellsuited for non-meteorological organi-sations dealing with environmentalrelated application domains.

From 6-10 April 2009 at the RegionalCenter for Mapping of Resources forDevelopment in Nairobi, Kenya, a

A meeting of the steering committeesubsequently took place in Pune,India, from 10 to 13 March and fo-cused on the selection of the candi-dates. A total of 301 mobilities areavailable from India to Europe and101 mobilities from Europe to India.The first mobilities are already under-

way and ITC hopes to welcome thefirst three PhD students on 15 June.

The same consortium is hoping to runa second round of the project in2010.

14 ITC News 2009-1

P A R T N E R S H I P N E W S

GEONETCAST at the RCMRD

Ben Maathuis maathuis@itc.nl

EU representatives Renata Russels and Raul Mateus Paul (head of UnitCentralised Operations, EuropeAid, ACP) with Dr. Tjivikua (Rector of the Polytechnic of Namibia)

Meeting of the steering committee of Lot 15 India

successful workshop was conductedentitled: “Installation, Configurationof a GEONETCast Ground ReceivingStation”. During this week an opera-tional local GEONETCast ground re-ceiving station was established andused for the purpose of the work-shop. The data and information re-ceived will support the regional cen-tre in its future activities in the region.

This one week workshop focused onthe following topics:• Providing an overview of the data

and products that are available inGEONETCast;

• Hands-on on setting up and con-figuring of a low cost C-BandGEONETCast ground receiving sta-tion at the RCMRD;

• Maintaining a consistent dataarchive using the GEONETCastData Manager;

• Introduction to the GEONETCasttoolbox, an ILWIS 3.6 OPEN Betabased plug-in capable to handlerelevant images and products fromGEONETCast for environmentalanalysis;

• Hands-on exercises to integrate thedata into a GIS and demonstrationsshowing the versatility ofGEONETCast and the IWLIS 3.6Open Beta Toolbox.

Back in 2003, early in my term ashead of research, a strategic deci-sion was taken to develop, extendand expand the ITC Research Pro-gramme through (alongside otherinitiatives) joint research withstrong research partners. For morethan five years, giving substance tothis decision was a focus of my at-tention and, in the course of this pe-riod, the ITC Research Programme

has been linked to a worldwidefamily of research partners througha series of joint research frameworkagreements.

At the very beginning of this era,Director of External Affairs SjaakBeerens briefed me on a visit he hadmade to Mexico City, where the di-rector of science of the UniversidadNacional Autonoma de Mexico

(UNAM) had expressed enthusiasmand tangible support for joint re-search with ITC. I followed this upwhen a high-level delegation fromUNAM visited ITC in July 2004 and,through a visit to UNAM in April2005, arranged an exploratory meet-ing for scientific research staff fromboth UNAM and ITC. This eventuallytook the form in March 2006 of ajoint research workshop held in

Software utilities that are used havebeen provided to the course partici-pants as well as the necessary con-tacts to acquire a license, documenta-tion needed to configure a groundreceiving station and a set of exer-cises for further analysis of data andproducts from GEONETCast. Theworkshop was jointly organized bystaff from RCMRD and theDepartment of Water Resources, ITC,The Netherlands.

15ITC News 2009-1

P A R T N E R S H I P N E W S

Mr. Lawrence Okello from RCMRD is explaining the antenna configuration to thecourse participants at the RCMRD

For further information please contact:

Dr. H. Farah (farah@rcmrd.org) orDr. B. Maathuis (maathuis@itc.nl)

Joint Research Strategy Culminates in Framework Agreement with Leading University in Mexico

Martin Hale hale@itc.nl

Mexico City, plus visits to field loca-tions, which was attended by ninescientists from ITC and more than adozen from UNAM.

Meanwhile UNAM and ITC hadlaunched a joint education pro-gramme which, on the part ofUNAM, involved the sections of itsInstituto de Geografía located atMorelia, about 400 km west ofMexico City. MSc students enrolled inthis programme began to make amodest start on joint research, under-taking projects on integrated land-scape management in the regionaround Morelia.

Back at ITC, I was developing andconcluding joint research agreementswith partners as close as Utrecht andas far afield as Yogyakarta andCochabamba. As joint research underthese agreements is commonly re-alised through jointly supervised andsupported sandwich-study-construc-tion graduate (PhD) students, theseagreements played a significant rolein the strategic expansion of the ITCGraduate Programme in the years2003 to 2008. During this period thenumber of graduate students in-creased more than threefold, with114 registrants in the ITC GraduateProgramme at the end of 2008 (seeFigure 1). The size and scientific con-tribution of the graduate studentcommunity of ITC now conform

closely to that of a university faculty,strengthening ITC’s position as its in-corporation (as a faculty of specialstatus) into the neighbouringUniversity of Twente approaches. But a formal agreement on joint re-search between UNAM and ITC wasproving tortuous to negotiate. Draftagreements were sent back andforth. Sections of the Instituto deGeografía located at Morelia, wherethere was on-going joint education,were emerging as the focal point forjoint research but these sections werereconstituted into the Centro deInvestigaciónes en GeografíaAmbiental. More draft agreementswere sent back and forth, revised andtranslated into Spanish. UNAMlawyers pondered the fine print. In2007, Dr Gerardo Bocco, an ITCalumnus and, in 1990, one of thefirst PhD graduates of the then em-bryonic ITC Graduate Programme,was appointed director of the Centrode Investigaciones en GeografíaAmbiental. With the increased confi-dence that his determined efforts toconclude the agreement would even-tually secure all the required signa-tures, Gerardo, the rector and I putour signatures to the agreementwhen Gerardo visited ITC inDecember 2008. Just two months later in Mexico City,the Secretario General and theCoordinador de la InvestigaciónCientífica of UNAM added their sig-natures, thereby concluding theagreement and laying the formalfoundations for our joint research.UNAM is a university of high aca-demic standing and amongst thelargest in the world with 250,000students. It has an extensive networkof Latin American universities andhence joint research with UNAM andits network holds great promise forcontributing to ITC’s development co-operation mission.

In the last five years, ITC has con-cluded 18 joint research frameworkagreements (see Table 1) and is likelyentering a phase of consolidatingthese whilst steering research fallingunder them to still higher standardsof quality, productivity and develop-ment relevance. ITC has recently in-troduced its Graduate PartnershipScheme (www.itc.nl/research/graduate/default.asp), which aims atsupporting a limited number of sand-wich PhD students selected by theAcademic Board of ITC on the basisof the credentials of the applicant,the quality of the proposal and thepledged contribution and commit-ment of the partner. We eagerly lookforward to receiving applicationslinked to those universities and or-ganisations with which ITC is alreadyaffiliated through joint researchframework agreements and to wel-coming, in particular, the first re-searchers under the new UNAM-ITCjoint research framework agreement.

16 ITC News 2009-1

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0 20 40 60 80 100 120

20032003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

34

43

50

74

96

114

Figure 1 Graduate registrants 2003-2008

Dr Gerardo Bocco, ITC alumnus and director of theCentro de Investigaciónes en Geografía Ambiental, and the rector of ITC signed the agreement

17ITC News 2009-1

P A R T N E R S H I P N E W S

University / organisation City Country Agreement date

National Remote Sensing Agency Hyderabad India July 2005Chinese Academy of Sciences (Bureau of Science and Technology) Beijing China August 2005Interface Cycling Expertise Utrecht Netherlands June 2007Wuhan University Wuhan China December 2005Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology Kumasi Ghana January 2006Universidad Mayor de San Simon Cochabamba Bolivia April 2006Regional Centre for Training in Aerospace Survey Ile-Ife Nigeria July 2006Chinese Academy of Surveying and Mapping Beijing China October 2006Universitas Gadjah Mada Yogyakarta Indonesia December 2006Naturalis Leiden Netherlands April 2007University of Salamaca Salamanca Spain June 2007University College Dublin Urban Institute Dublin Ireland August 2007islamic Azad University Tehran Iran October 2007East China Normal University Shanghai China December 2007Chengdu University of Technology Chengdu China December 2007CEPT University Ahmedabad India May 2008Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico Mexico City Mexico February 2009K N Toosi University Tehran Iran February 2009

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Table 1 Joint research framework agreements

18 ITC News 2009-1

A N N O U N C E M E N T S

The ISPRS Foundation is seeking ap-plications from individuals wishingto obtain travel assistance from theTrust Fund Amsterdam 2000 (admin-istered by the ISPRS Foundation) toparticipate in the AfricaGIS Interna-tional Conference, which will beheld in Kampala, Uganda, from 26to 30 October 2009.

This book delineates how to com-bine science and geospatial tech-nologies for smart environmentalmanagement. The book describes avariety of sensors, ranging fromground-based to airborne and satel-lite-borne, and their use in a diver-sity of geographical regions and en-vironmental settings, from coastalto inland saline areas. It provides guidance on how to iden-tify and choose the right remotesensing tools and datasets requiredbased on the purpose of the studyand the environmental setting. Thebook is organised into three sections: • Section I: Soil Salinity and Remote

Sensing: The Object and the Toolfocuses on the relationships be-tween the landscape-object salinityand the remote sensing tools.

• Section II: Trends in Mapping SoilSalinity and Monitoring SalinizationUsing Remote and ProximalSensing provides a variety of casestudies dealing with soil salinitymapping and monitoring theprocess of salinisation.

• Section III: Diversity of Approachesto Modeling Soil Salinity andSalinization demonstrates the di-versity of approaches used in mod-elling soil salinity and salinisation inspace and time.

The book includes analyses of basicissues of remote detection, such asthe spectral behaviour of salt typesand vegetation influence, and evalua-tions of currently available remotesensing platforms, delineating theiradvantages and disadvantages. Theaccompanying CD-ROM providescolour images that enhance the ma-terial discussed in the text. The mix-ture of fundamental concepts, latesttechnological reviews, and practicalapplication examples makes this anideal resource for environmental as-sessment and decision making.

The book is edited by GracielaMetternicht and Alfred Zinck (retiredITC Professor). ITC staff (Dr Abbas

Farshad, Dr Dhruba Pikha Shresthaand Dr Alfred Zinck) and ITC alumni(Dr Graciela Metternicht and DrJamshid Farifteh) have contributed tothis book by writing some chapters.

Application DeadlineThe application form can be down-loaded from the ISPRS website(www.isprs.org/foundation) and, afterreading the preamble, applicantsshould complete and submit theform. The deadline for receipt of ap-plications is 10 July 2009.

Remote Sensing of Soil Salinization: Impact on Land Management

A New Book Published by CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group

announcements

Opportunity to Apply for Travel Grant to Attend AfricaGIS 2009

To order:www.taylorandfrancis.com

Search the book using ISBN 9781420065022

The conference Land Governance inSupport of the Millennium Develop-ment Goals: Responding to NewChallenges took place at the WorldBank Headquarters in WashingtonDC, in March 2009. The conferencewas organised by the InternationalFederation of Surveyors (FIG) andthe World Bank. The general aimwas to emphasise the importantrole of land governance in imple-menting the Millennium Develop-ment Goals (MDGs) and to showhow FIG and the World Bank workin parallel in this regard.

In the organising committee, FIG wasrepresented by President Stig Enemarkand Professor Paul van der Molenfrom ITC. Leading from the WorldBank was Klaus Deininger, lead econ-omist, World Bank Land ThematicGroup. The sponsors of the eventwere ESRI, Trimble, Dutch Kadaster,GTZ, Leica Geomatics and ITC.

The UNU School of Land Administra -tion at ITC gave presentations at the

conference. Chris Paresi talked onITC’s involvement in capacity buildingin disaster management and land ad-ministration. He informed the panelthat the aim of the School was tomeet the growing need for profes-sional training in land administration.Training courses are conducted at ITCand also abroad. In 2008, for exam-ple, short, tailor-made and refreshercourses were conducted in China,Ghana, Hungary, Namibia, Senegaland Tanzania. In 2009, these coursesare being conducted in Mongolia,Namibia, Nepal, Vietnam andIndonesia. Besides short courses, theSchool also offers opportunities forDiploma, MSc and PhD degreecourses. Research focuses on suchfields as innovative land administra-tion systems and governance, Geo-ICT for innovation land administrationsystems, and drivers for investment inland administration systems.Furthermore, the School is also in-volved in such activities as providingland administration project services inGuatemala, Rwanda and Uzbekistan;

knowledge exchange through partici-pation in conferences; and network-ing through the UN-Habitat GlobalLand Tool Network, through aca-demic partnership, and with ITCalumni. These are among the strate-gies used at ITC to contribute to landgovernance, thereby supporting theMDGs. The School is a joint pro-gramme in which the ITC Departmentof Urban and Regional Planning andGeo-information Management col-laborates with the Dutch Cadastre,Land Registry and Mapping Agency(Kadaster).

Christiaan Lemmen gave a presenta-tion on the experiences of using high-resolution imagery as a basis for col-lecting data for incorporation in theSocial Tenure Domain Model (STDM),an open-source software packagethat is currently being developedjointly by ITC, UN-Habitat and FIG.The STDM is a pro-poor land adminis-tration tool intended to cover landadministration in terms of administra-tive and spatial components.

19ITC News 2009-1

E V E N T S

events

Land Governance in Support of the Millennium Development Goals

Monica Lengoiboni lengoiboni@itc.nl

The conference Land Governance in Support of the MillenniumDevelopment Goals: Responding to New Challenges took place atthe World Bank Headquarters in Washington DC, in March 2009

Christiaan Lemmen giving a presentation on the experiences of usinghigh-resolution imagery as a basis for data collection

Whereas conventional land adminis-tration systems relate people’snames/addresses to land parcels (orspatial units) via formal rights, theSTDM has the ability to relate a per-sonal identifier (e.g. fingerprints) to acoordinate point on the land used bythat person via a social tenure rela-tion. Depending on the local condi-tions, a variety of social tenure rela-tionships and basically all types ofland rights (e.g. customary, informal,overlapping) can be accommodated.The STDM thus provides an extensiblebasis for an efficient and effective sys-tem of land rights recording. Themodel will be a useful tool for devel-oping countries, where it can be usedto obtain an inventory of all land andrights as they exist. This will enablebetter decision making in managingland and land use and in planning fordevelopment purposes. A post-con-ference meeting with further reviewswas also organised for participants in-terested in learning more about theSTDM. Since the STDM is open-source software, it will allow furtherdevelopment of functionalities on dif-ferent platforms.

The Institute of Housing Studies(IHS) in Rotterdam organised thethird edition of the InternationalUrban Student Day on 18 March.Two years ago, the Institute of So-cial Studies (ISS) in The Hague tookthe initiative to bring together in-ternational students in the Nether-lands who were following coursesrelated to urban planning and man-agement. In 2008, this initiative wasfollowed up by ITC’s Urban Planningand Management department,which organised a full day of pre-sentations, debate and visits tourban neighbourhoods in Enschede.

On this sunny day in March, the IHS(situated on the campus of theErasmus University) received a total ofsome 150 students, including 35from ITC. As on the two previous oc-casions, urban students from thethree international institutes (IHS, ISSand ITC) intermingled, shared experi-ences, and at the same time discov-ered aspects of urban development inthe Netherlands.

After a welcome from IHS staff, Chrisvan Langen, head of the RotterdamAcademy of Architecture & UrbanDesign, gave a presentation on the

urban development of the city ofRotterdam. At the end of the morn-ing, the whole group embarked on aboat trip along the river Maas, duringwhich they could appreciate the re-cent waterfront and port develop-ments in Rotterdam and enjoy thepleasant spring weather from the topdeck.

A special experience was the visit tothe Afrikaanderwijk, one of the poor-est neighbourhoods in Rotterdam.Architect Dennis Kaspori gave an in-spiring talk about the attempts of theFreehouse project to build up entre-

In the closing session of the confer-ence, Professor Stig Enemark con-cluded that “land governance is acrucial issue in meeting the MDGsand should be high on the globalagenda. New challenges, also in rela-tion to climate change, food security,energy scarcity, natural disasters,urban growth, and environmentaldegradation need to be met. This isonly possible in a multidisciplinary ap-proach – which calls for partnership.It can be observed that the technol-ogy tools as available today are farahead compared to legal and institu-tional tools. This implies that a goodpartnership is needed for applicationsof sophisticated technology tools,whereas capacity building and learn-

ing should be most relevant and ur-gent. In the process of land adminis-tration, the continuum of land rightsas developed by UN-Habitat providesa good basis since this approach issocially embedded. Finding evidenceon the ground remains a key issue;this is where the land professionalsbecome involved. This process is ex-pensive – hence a good monitoringof the money spent is most relevant.Looking at the strong demand fromclient countries addressing land ad-ministration, there are reasons to beoptimistic as these countries are re-sponding to challenges of implement-ing the Millennium DevelopmentGoals by means of land governance.”

20 ITC News 2009-1

E V E N T S

Conference proceedings and reports can be accessed at the FIGwebsite (www.fig.net/pub/fig_wb_2009/) and at the World Bankwebsite (http://econ.worldbank > Data & Research > Research >Programs > Sustainable Rural an... > Events > Proceedings: LandGovernance in Support ...).

More information about the UNU-ITC School of Land Administrationcan be found at www.itc.nl/unu/la.

150 International Urban Students Meet in Rotterdam

Liza Groenendijk groenendijk@itc.nl

Emile Dopheide dopheide@itc.nl

21ITC News 2009-1

E V E N T S

preneurship in a multicultural envi-ronment by linking creativity and localinitiative and highlighting the positiveelements within these neighbour-hoods. This example of an integratedapproach to local economic develop-ment in the Netherlands could becompared with similar experiencesand challenges faced by some of thestudents in their home countries.Naturally the whole group visited thelocal open market, where studentscontributed in their own way to thelocal economic development. Thewell organised day (thanks to our IHScolleagues Marijk Huysman andYiping Fang) concluded with an infor-mal gathering over drinks and locallyprepared exotic snacks at the neigh-bourhood centre.

Once again, on this third Interna tionalUrban Student Day, the combinationof interesting impressions of urbandevelopment in the Netherlands withsocial interaction among urban stu-dents from the three international in-stitutes proved a great success.

150 urban students meet in Rotterdam

Jan Fransen, deputy director IHS, welcomingthe international urban students

Students embarking on the boat trip alongthe river Maas

O.O. Alan Software Developer Department of Urban and Regional Planning and Geo-information Management 1 February 2009

Ms. J.A.M. Lurvink Secretary to the Directorate 1 March 2009

Dipl. Ing. K.A. Grabmaier Department of Earth Observation Science 1 February 2009

Dr. J. de Leeuw Department of Natural Resources 1 March 2009

Ms. Drs. J.A. Fokkens Information Technology Department 15 March 2009

Welcometo ITC

Staffleaving

Welcome and leaving

staff news

Students from eight internationalinstitutes within the Netherlandsdisplayed their talents to the fulland showed great team spirit inthe 31st International EducationSports Day, which took place onWednesday, 28 March 2009.

The sports day is one of theunique events for internationalstudents in the Netherlands andhas been conducted each yearsince 1980. This year’s sports daywas hosted by the Institute ofSocial Studies.

Between 600 and 700 interna-tional students from the Instituteof Social Studies (ISS), The Hague;Radio Nederland TrainingCentrum, (RNTC), Hilversum; theInstitute for Housing and UrbanDevelopment Studies (IHS),Rotterdam; Maritime Economicsand Logistics (MEL/EUR),Rotterdam; the Institute for WaterEducation (IHE-UNESCO), Delft;Delft University of Technology(TUD), Delft; SAXION University ofApplied Sciences, Enschede; andITC competed at soccer, volleyball,basketball, table tennis, bad-minton, chess, darts and in a relayrace.

ITC achieved first place in the soc-cer, volleyball and darts competi-tions, and third place in table ten-nis and beach relay. The overallchampion was IHE Delft, ITC’schief rival for the overall champi-onship right from the early days.To date ITC has 16 wins to itscredit, IHE 12 wins.

International EducationSports Day 2009

ITC News 2009-122

To bid farewell to the MSc gradu-ates, a spring party was organisedat ITC on Thursday, 5 March 2009.The first part of the evening had acompetitive element, with stu-dents and staff members vying forhonours in darts, snooker andshuffleboard. There was also theopportunity to pose in front ofthe barrel organ or a panoramicposter of the ITC building.

The organ grinders attracted agood deal of attention as theywere wearing traditional Dutchcostumes. Many students and staffmembers posed together with theorgan grinders in front of the in-strument. Some students were al-lowed to try their hand at organgrinding and discovered that itwas important to turn the wheelat a steady pace to produce melo-dious music.

Betty Mulianga (GEM MSc gradu-ate) brought the competitive partof the evening to a close with anaward ceremony, where the bestplayers in each competition werepresented with a prize. The sec-ond part of the evening was de-voted to music and dancing, withDJ Ronnie doing the honours.

Spring Party

ITC News 2009-1 23

Janneke Kalf / Jorien Terlouw itcnews@itc.nl

24 ITC News 2009-1

E V E N T S

RationaleThe world is confronted with the rap-idly growing impact of disasters, es-pecially severe in developing coun-tries, and governments have toincorporate risk reduction strategiesin development planning at differentlevels. Risk assessment can only becarried out effectively when it isbased on extensive, multidisciplinarystudies on the basis of spatial infor-mation and analysis. Including theconcepts of disaster geo-informationmanagement (DGIM) requires capac-ity building and training of disasterrisk management (DRM) experts andprofessionals, as stressed in the UN-ISDR’s Hyogo Framework of Action2005-2015.

Many initiatives dealing with earthobservation (EO) and geo-information(GI) for DRM are ongoing and focus-ing on developing countries most re-quiring knowledgeable resource per-sons on the ground. To what extent iscapacity in economically less devel-oped countries sufficient, and whatare effective mechanisms to apply GIdata?

The United Nations University–ITCSchool for Disaster Geo-InformationManagement (UNU-ITC DGIM) hasbeen active in capacity building of or-

ganisations in developing countriesand supporting networks of universi-ties and training institutes from devel-oping countries that are involved intraining and research in the use of GIscience and EO for DRM. On the oc-casion of the renewal of the agree-ment with the UNU for the comingyears, UNU-ITC DGIM invites partnerorganisations to discuss the require-ments for capacity building in DGIMin the coming years.

Workshop objectivesThe seminar has the following mainobjectives:• assessment of capacity needs of or-

ganisations related to DRM• defining optimal modes for capac-

ity building: university networks,short courses, distance education,graduate programmes

• improved collaboration of interna-tional organisations involved in ca-pacity building for DGIM

• linking research and training in ca-pacity building

• exploring better links to more tech-nically oriented DRM programmes(International Charter, GEOSS).

OutcomeComprehensive understanding of ex-isting geoinformatics capacity forDRM in international organisations,

NGOs and knowledge centers activein less developed countries, currentcapacity buildings needs, and recom-mendations to the diverse actors inthe DRM field on suitable capacitybuilding means and possibilities, andoptimal integration of knowledgenetworks and research.

ParticipantsOn invitation, about 30-35 partici-pants and speakers from:• international organisations dealing

with the implementation of GI forenvironmental applications

• international capacity building or-ganisations dealing with DRM

• user organisations and NGOs• university networks dealing with

DRM• knowledge centers / universities• Limited number of open applica-

tions.

Content of the executive seminarThe seminar will be focus on the fol-lowing key topics:• the role of GI for disaster risk as-

sessment in developing countries• requirements for capacity building

in GI for DGIM• international initiatives for GI and

capacity building in DRR• capacity building: different modes

of implementation• UNU and capacity building for DRR• capacity building and research in GI

for DGIM.

Capacity Building in Disaster Geo-information Management in DevelopingCountries

23-25 September 2009, ITC, Enschede, the Netherlands

For more informationITCDr. Norman Kerle / Dr. Cees van WestenP.O. Box 6 7500 AA EnschedeThe NetherlandsT: +31 (0)53 4874 406 / 4874 45 41E:kerle@itc.nl / westen@itc.nl I: www.itc.nl/unu/dgim

At the annual conference of theAmerican Association of Photogram -metry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS)held in Baltimore, Maryland, USA,from 9 to 13 March 2009, Gary Flo-rence was elected vice-president.

Gary Florence is known to many inthe ITC community and is currentlygeneral manager of Photo Science inFlorida. His geospatial experiencespans both the national and interna-tional sectors. He received a BSc de-gree from the University ofWisconsin, Green Bay, and an MScdegree from ITC, the Netherlands.

Sponsored by the EuropeanDevelopment Bank, Florence workedon the Countrywide Animal andRange Assessment Project inBotswana, where he applied variousremote sensing techniques and ex-tensive ground truth field verificationto conduct a detailed rangeland in-ventory and carrying capacity assess-ment of the Kalahari. Later, working

Both Laos and Cambodia are fasci-nating beautiful countries in theMekong region. However, bothcountries have also suffered from adark history. In recent years, recon-struction efforts have progressedand political stability has returned.Both countries are on the road torecovery. International donors con-

tribute considerably and since a fewyears ago Cambodians have been el-igible to receive NFP fellowships.Hopefully the programme will soonbe opened up to Laos too.

The number of ITC alumni is very lowbecause of the history and the limitedaccess to fellowships. But ITC is very

committed to contributing to the re-construction by assisting with capac-ity building and with strengtheningthe higher education sector.

ITC’s representative in Southeast Asiavisited Cambodia in November 2008and Laos PDR in December 2008.Meetings were held with alumni, and

as a remote sensing consultant forthe Food and AgricultureOrganization of the United Nations,Florence again combined various re-mote sensing techniques and field-work to conduct a land cover inven-tory of Baluchistan, Pakistan. He thenworked in the USA, managing a vari-ety of mapping projects for both thepublic and private sectors. This expe-rience included serving as a coastalzone analyst for Louisiana DNR andlater as director of the Resource DataDepartment for the Southwest FloridaWater Management District.

His private sector experience includesserving as project manager on a widevariety of mapping projects for MidStates Engineering, Chicago AerialSurveys, Geonex, and Greenhorn &O’Mara (G&O). During his tenurewith G&O, he served five years asproject manager for the NationalWetlands Inventory Programme spon-sored by the U.S. Fish and WildlifeService. In 2004, Florence joined

Photo Science to manage their officein St Petersburg, Florida.

Florence has been an active memberof ASPRS since 1982, serving theASPRS Florida Region as director, sec-retary/treasurer, vice-president, presi-dent and past president. He has alsoserved at national level as director ofthe Florida Region. He has partici-pated on a variety of committees andserved as the chairman of the 2007annual conference held in Tampa,Florida.

25ITC News 2009-1

L I F E A F T E R I T C

Gary Florence

Alumni Meet in Laos and Cambodia

Marjan Kreijns kreijns@itc.nl

life after itc

ITC Alumnus Gary Florence Elected ASPRS Vice-President

Tsehaie Woldai woldai@itc.nl

26 ITC News 2009-1

L I F E A F T E R I T C

lively discussions took place on thestatus of the geo-information sectorand its applications and the role itcan play in this phase of develop-ment.

Mr Kanya Souksakoun from the Center for Environment andDevelopment Studies (CEDS), NUOL

Group of ITC alumni during dinner in Phnom Pehn, Cambodia: Mr SoVanna, Ministry of Land Management, Urban Planning andConstruction; Mr Ngin Sambat, team leader, Ton Le Sap Land UseClassification and Buffer Zone Monitoring Project (LUCBZM); Dr KimSreang Bouy, managing director Associated Experts of Cambodia; andMr Ek Menrith, vice-director Remote Sensing/GIS Centre, Ministry ofEnvironment

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27ITC News 2009-1

L I F E A F T E R I T C / S T A F F N E W S

As an officer in the Australian Army,I graduated with an MSc (PhE) atDelft in 1965. My thesis supervisorwas Dr H.G. Jerie. For much of 1965,I was president of the ITC StudentAssociation. Messrs Nkembe (Camer-oun) and Malik (Kenya) precededme and Betsy Chase (Canada) suc-ceeded me. I am still in touch withBetsy (now Holt).

My photogrammetric career back inAustralia was brief. I commanded theAustralian Army’s sole mapping unitin the Vietnam War in 1968-69. In1973, I transferred to purely militaryroles for the rest of my career. Aged72, I am now retired and live inCanberra. I keep in touch withProfessor John Trinder in Sydney. He

On Wednesday, 17 December 2008,on the occasion of assuming officeas professor of geo-information forgovernance, Professor Yola Geor-giadou delivered her inaugural ad-dress entitled “Using Geo-Informa-tion: From a Market to a Polis Per-spective”.

The study of the administrative use ofgeo-information is an area of increas-ing interest, both in the Netherlandsand globally. GIDEON, the new Dutchvision and strategy concerning geo-information focuses on promotingthe use of geo-information in publicgovernance and policy processes.

Commercial virtual globes (such asGoogle Earth) and scientific infra-structures on the internet (such asDigital Earth) are revolutionising theway in which we use and producegeo-information. The use of geo-in-formation and the accompanyingtechnologies encompasses people’sactual use practices in decision andpolicy making, information exchangebetween organisations, participatoryprocedures, the values that peoplepursue (efficiency, equity, legitimacy,privacy, security and sustainability),and the rules that prescribe by law orsimply encourage the optimal use.Values, practices and rules can be

and I were ITC students together. Ioften wonder how my good Nigerianfriends A.B. Umo and Ahmed Musaare managing. Sadly, I lost contactwith them at the time of the terribleBiafran War in 1968. My wife and Iplan to visit another fellow ITC stu-dent, Tom Hasek, in Vancouver dur-ing 2009.

Yvonne and I think back on our daysat Delft and Rijswijk (where our homewas) with great affection. We havejust decorated our Christmas tree andwe still have some Dutch decorationsfrom our first ever Christmas tree in1963!

With every good wish,John Bullen

News from a Participant

John Bullen bullen22997@alumni.itc.nl

John Bullen

Yola Georgiadou

Inaugural Address Yola Georgiadou

Marion van Rinsum rinsum@itc.nl

staff news

28 ITC News 2009-1

S T A F F N E W S

Delivering his inaugural address“Land Administration: To See theChange from Day to Day” on 22April, Dr Jaap Zevenbergen ac-cepted his appointment as professorof land administration systems atITC, Enschede.

Professor Martien Molenaar, rector ofITC, sees this appointment as a rein-forcement of the land administrationprofile within his Institute (which willintegrate with the University ofTwente in 2010). There is a great de-mand worldwide for expertise in thefield of cadastre and land administra-tion. Good land registration con-tributes to social stabilisation and is acondition for development. Not fornothing has a School for LandAdministration Studies been estab-lished at ITC in cooperation with theUnited Nations University and theNetherlands Cadastre. Delft Universityof Technology too makes a significantcontribution in this respect.

In his address, Jaap stated that pres-sure on land was increasing world-wide. Changes in land use cannot beavoided. In the Netherlands, this is allneatly regulated, thanks in part to theefficient registration of land rights,land use and also land value. But thisis not the case everywhere - unfortu-

nately in many countries land admin-istration functions poorly, with nega-tive effects on development. In Jaap’sview, a land administration system isa combination of elements on a prac-tical level to realise a certain goal.Land administration is a question ofrelationships between people andground. These relationships can mani-fest themselves in many ways. In es-tablishing these relationships, there isa sharp focus on parcel boundaries –although in general no intensive landuse takes place there ... it is more in-tensive in the central parts of theparcels. Still there are many borderconflicts relating to parcels. That iswhy field observation is important,and especially links with field objects.Although the visible boundaries arenot always the legal boundaries,high-resolution satellite images canbe very useful. Moreover, these im-ages can be understood by everyone.Maps and registration derived fromthese can be used for many purposes.Often the local population may notreally appreciate what a land surveyorwith his instrument is actually doing.

In the field of research, Jaap wishesto focus further on the developmentof the (ITC internally developed)Social Tenure Domain Model, soundsimple up-to-date methods of land

administration (Jaap’s historical per-spective was brilliant here - appar-ently it always begins with compli-cated procedures, leading later to asimpler procedure of transferring landrights), the use of ICT, the use of landadministration in a broader context,and also evaluations of existing sys-tems in order to learn from them.Cooperation with other disciplines isa condition.

Inaugural Address Jaap Zevenbergen

Christiaan Lemmen lemmen@itc.nl

viewed from the perspective (orthrough the lens) of the market orthe polis. Depending on the chosenlens, we acquire radically different in-sights into the use of geo-informationas a social phenomenon. Seen from apolis lens, values are not easily meas-urable standards of goodness, domi-nant public management ideas canbe the source of technical-organisa-

tional change in government whilepolicies can be fruitfully examined aspersuasive arguments to target audi-ences. With a polis lens, we can per-haps explain how authentic humanactors, groups and communities withdifferent values, interests and motiva-tions use geo-information, and howbenefits for society may or may notfollow. Furthermore, we can probably

better understand the emergence ofnew practices, the clash of values,and the worldwide rules that underliethe commercial virtual globes and sci-entific infrastructures on the internet.

Jaap Zevenbergen