By Saira Khan
Laura Mills, Co-Founder and Director of Data Science at Data Science for Sustainable Development (DSSD), sat down with the Signal Program team to discuss DSSD’s newly updated platform: GIS for Peace. DSSD uses data science, software development, and GIS services to support initiatives undertaken by organizations that are working towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The GIS for Peace Platform is a major component of their work and has two main goals: one is to document relevant GIS tools, data, and stakeholders in the peacebuilding community and the other is to foster community amongst peacebuilders. Keep reading to learn more about GIS for Peace, and explore the newly updated platform here!
Can you briefly describe what GIS for Peace is and what inspired DSSD to create it?
We describe GIS for Peace as a community engagement platform and a one-stop-shop resource repository. The platform hosts knowledge and inspiration about GIS applications for peacebuilding in one interactive, searchable, and filterable website. The platform is primarily geared towards peacebuilders who are interested in enhancing their work through geospatial analytics, as well as stakeholders who are interested in bridging GIS and peace.
The idea for GIS for Peace came to fruition in 2021 when DSSD first established itself. Around that time, we began having insightful and productive dialogues about the use of innovation, technology, data, and maps, with the Alliance for Peacebuilding (AFP). They subsequently connected us with many more organizations and relevant actors in the space. This led to a working relationship with Olivier Cottray, who had initiated a similar concept while working with the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD). By the time we connected in 2021, he had transitioned to being the Director of Humanitarian Solutions at Esri. Olivier was a key player in helping us concretely identify how GIS could be utilized for peacebuilding and was critical to envisioning and actualizing the GIS for Peace platform. With that said, we convened with many peacebuilders to determine if they’d be interested in a platform like GIS for Peace. We received a resounding yes, which gave us a purpose to continue building it. The development of the platform has been iterative, and we’re regularly in touch with peacebuilders from around the world and are proud that AFP and Esri are still important collaborators, as peace experts and technical partners, respectively.
Your technical partner, Esri, recently launched the Humanitarian GIS Hub. Is there a link between Esri’s Humanitarian GIS Hub and DSSD’s GIS for Peace?
GIS for Peace is a parallel, sister platform to the Humanitarian GIS Hub. The Humanitarian GIS Hub is focused on the uses of GIS and the humanitarian space, generally speaking, while GIS for Peace has a more specific focus on GIS and peace. With that said, we worked closely with Olivier Cottray (ESRI) to develop GIS for Peace, so the two platforms are similarly built.
GIS for Peace hosts a lot of inspiring examples that demonstrate how GIS has been used for peacebuilding. Which resource do you find particularly impactful?
As you said, the platform has many different types of resources, which we have categorized as Open Data, Tools and Applications, and Case Studies. In the Tools and Applications category, we feature a tool developed by GICHD called IMSMA Core. It’s an information management system that supports mine action, specifically the removal of landmines and unexploded ordinates from the ground. It’s created to be an efficient data collection tool that enables the development of action plans while also supporting real-time mapping. The tool is customizable and can be configured to meet different needs and requirements and is a good example of how we can transform an unsafe space into a safe one, or as we like to say “GIS transforms contested spaces into shared spaces”. I believe that the IMSMA Core tool really represents how maps and GIS strengthen peace processes, which is something we hope to foster through the GIS for Peace Platform.
In addition to being a resource hub, you mentioned that you’d like GIS for Peace to be a community engagement platform. How do you hope peacebuilders accessing the platform will navigate the website and build a community?
While GIS for Peace hosts a really wide range of valuable datasets and tools, we hope that the interaction with the platform does not start and stop with a data download. We believe that datasets are just one node in a network of multiple critical nodes, including data, processes, and relationships, which must be leveraged to move peacebuilding forward. We hope that the platform sparks inspiration from a variety of angles and that this is a centralized space where peacebuilders can learn how to leverage GIS for their work. We really want this platform to be the go-to website for when conflict prevention professionals think of GIS and peacebuilding together. Connecting the entire peacebuilding community on one platform will make collaborative action much more efficient and enable us to collectively push for positive impact.
What are some GIS for Peace platform features that users can expect to see? How will this change with time?
The GIS for Peace platform is map-centric and has a user-friendly interface. The ontology for the website was developed in coordination with the Alliance for Peacebuilding considering their Eirene Peacebuilding Indicator Database, so hopefully that resonates with peacebuilders. Users can expect to see a stakeholder map and we would also like to feature work done by stakeholders in this space. We also ask users to directly submit resources into our repository through a survey on the site and include their contact information so we can reach out and learn more about their work. Submitting resources and contributing to this platform is highly encouraged by us!
Perhaps most importantly, is our interest in developing relationships with the platform’s users. We want to develop an iterative and meaningful user-feedback loop, which will allow us to update the platform accordingly and adjust it according to the needs and requests of end users.
And finally, Laura, what advice would you give to people who are applying GIS tools and technologies for peacekeeping for the first time?
From the outside, learning new technical skills – whether it’s learning how to code, or navigating GIS software, can appear to be a very individual and perhaps a lonely task. But in actuality, I have found that GIS and data science thrive on collaboration and knowledge sharing. When you get into this technical realm, you’ll see that people are constantly sharing code snippets, case studies, etc. I would advise anyone entering the field of GIS to heavily invest in researching the space to understand what’s been done before to accurately identify the right tools and people to consult for your own work. Personally, I found there were multiple sources of inspiration out there, and understanding them really made a positive impact on my work in the end.
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Laura Mills is a proud member of the Atrocity Prevention’s Lab Community of Practice (COP) and DSSD is a trusted partner of the Signal Program. You can find Laura in the COP or reach out to her at lkkmills@dssdglobal.org to learn more, contribute resources to the site, or share feedback about the GIS for Peace platform.