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Dr Rebecca Maserumule at the Climate Change Summit in March 2009.
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Updating the Minister of Science and Technology, Naledi Pandor, on progress during an official visit to the CSIR in October, while Dr Emma Archer (left) looks on.
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Dr Rebecca Maserumule discusses the SA Risk and Vulnerability Atlas case studies with Dr Pat Manders, acting Executive Director of CSIR Natural Resources and the Environment (left) and Dr Sibusiso Sibisi, President of the CSIR (centre).
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Rebecca Maserumule, SARVA Project Manager
As a team we feel that it is important to take this opportunity to pause and reflect upon the progress of this past year as we move forward into the new year. Our actions have been guided by our purpose, which is to bridge the gap between global change science and policy or decisions made at the local level.
The recent unveiling of the Department of Science and Technology's Global Change Grand Challenge architecture - which details how different initiatives within the structure function while complementing the efforts of other institutions - has assisted with our outreach. Stakeholders have a clearer understanding that our focus at the local level will improve our ability to have a positive impact sooner than later, without the concern that they will be left out of the benefits to be gained by the successful implementation of the overall Global Change Grand Challenge.
They say that feedback is the breakfast of champions. The SARVA team understood early on in the process that the success of the first phase of the project would not be determined by the number of data sets uploaded onto our electronic spatial database, but by our ability to actively listen to the needs and expectations of our prospective users.
Our first official foray in to the public arena began at the Climate Change Summit sponsored by the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) and the Department of Science and Technology (DST) in March 2009. The opportunity to exhibit and interact with potential stakeholders was a valuable experience, which has led to the decision to ensure that communication remains a cornerstone of the process to develop the electronic spatial database.
We are proud to say that the majority of our key decisions for the electronic spatial database system have been made after soliciting input from user surveys and workshops. We believe that this approach will be important for the long-term sustainability of the SARVA initiative.
SARVA team members have attended numerous workshops and presented to stakeholders across different sectors ranging from industry, scientific institutions and government at both the local and national level. While we cannot mention them all I would like to highlight the users' workshop held in June 2009 at the CSIR-ICC. Delegates from national government departments, local municipalities and science institutions met at the workshop to discuss the information that they believed would be valuable to provide in the electronic spatial database, as well as the possible decisions that they would expect the SARVA initiative to support.
Given the tight schedule that we have for meeting our deadlines in the first phase of the project, we have made a conscious decision to focus on forging close relationships with a few stakeholders of which the South African Local Government Association (SALGA) is one. The first interaction with SALGA occurred during a local government indaba co-sponsored by the DEA and SALGA in July 2009.
Since then we have continued to further our relationship through a series of presentations at SALGA headquarters in Gauteng as well as interaction at the provincial level during the opportunity to attend a Working Group session. Going forward we plan to continue interacting with SALGA at district and local levels as we solicit input to ensure that the electronic spatial database system is more likely to meet the needs of local government.
The official launch of the SARVA website and e-Newsletter in October 2009 has ensured that our stakeholders will continue to learn about our progress as well as interact with the SARVA team, even if only in a passive way.
The beta version of the electronic spatial database will be up and running by mid-December 2009. By leveraging existing relationships with the South African Environmental Observation Network (SAEON), SARVA has benefited from the development of the Collaborative GIS (CoGIS) which will serve as the technological platform of the electronic spatial database. The beta version of the SARVA system will have numerous maps ranging from socio-economic trends and climate downscaling with project rainfall changes to maps which show the locations of terrestrial and marine protected areas.
Strategic relationships forged with the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI), the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) Built Environment and the Climate System Analysis Group (CSAG) at the University of Cape Town (UCT) have ensured that SARVA has access to the value-added products which will serve as the core of information provided for our prospective users.
In January and February 2010, a robust stakeholder engagement process will begin which will be facilitated by more workshops at local and national government to solicit feedback which will guide changes to the beta system. An official beta testing session with prospective users from diverse background to gauge the beta system's usability across different sectors will be held toward the end of February 2010. During the sessions users will have the opportunity to suggest changes that will improve the electronic spatial platform's ability to effectively facilitate the integration of scientific output in the decision-making process.
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