Spatial data infrastructure (SDI) for sustainable land management

Abstract

This paper elaborates on perspectives presented in the recent literature, which identify increased use of geoinformatics in the design of interdisciplinary geo-information systems and decision support systems for realizing sustainable land management at different scales and for specific user groups. The realization of the potential of geo-information systems in supporting sustainable land management depends on a number of factors. Efficient and reliable access to well-harmonized information is one of these. In this respect, the literature also alludes to an emerging digital geo-information infrastructure and policy framework at global, regional, national and local levels, which will make available, for example, significant soil research output that is now inaccessibly stored in archives and libraries. The paper presents the concept of geo-information infrastructure (GII) or spatial data infrastructure (SDI) as a tool to facilitate access to, and responsible use of geo-information at affordable cost in support of sustainable land management. It presents the notion that a national SDI is composed of networked SDIs which have been designed and implemented to serve very specific application sectors at the national, regional or municipal level. “Sustainable land management” could be such an application sector. The paper traces the history of the development of the SDI concept. It identifies the high expectations of national information infrastructure (of which SDI is a subset), in terms of achieving new economic and social development goals and improved public services, since President Clinton introduced the “electronic information highway” metaphor in his political platform. These expectations have also been expressed in the “information society” initiatives of the European Union. The paper illuminates the necessity of the legal and regulatory changes which will have to be made in order to achieve the open geo-information market that must be at the foundation of the expectations expressed. It will make the case that the technical developments and the institutional, organizational and human resources development in the design, implementation and maintenance of SDIs for a specific application sector must run in parallel. Successful sustained implementation will depend on clear “political” accountability for its integrity, and on a local regulatory environment that is in harmony with the more senior legislation and regulation at, eg, the national or supranational levels. The paper concludes with a set of recommended practices in the develop-