Congratulations to the Department of Science and Technology! Their SumbandilaSat which means "to lead the way" in Venda, was successfully launched onboard a Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Thursday at 17:55 South African time. The latest on the satellite at the time of going to print was that all systems were working well and we can look forward to the first imagery in the next month or two. SumbandilaSat will bring 6,25m resolution imagery in 6 mutlispectral bands to South African users. Although it has a relatively limited acquisition capability, the imagery will be useful in the verification of other national and regional satellite based mapping initiatives and certainly shows promise in servicing the agriculture, forestry, mine rehabilitation, urban mapping, air and water quality sectors.
Notwithstanding the impressive engineering accomplishment associated with the small budget allocated to SumbandilaSat, the most significant achievement within the program is arguably the development of the open data policy governing the dissemination of the image data to government users.
Free and open access to data generally falls under the ambit of a national spatial data infrastructure (SDI) initiative. SDI provides a platform for spatial data users, producers and those that manage it, to distribute the data more efficiently. Governments all over the world are realising the value of national spatial data infrastructures and are generally making major investments to establish them. However, most current literature points to the fact that the implementation of formal NSDI in Africa is extremely poor.
However, one has to question why it is that as tax paying citizens in South Africa, we have to purchase local geological map series data over the counter when this same data for Canada and Australia for example, is freely available via the internet – even to us.
Other fundamental datasets which do not have associated “transformed” data policies include archive weather station data, deeds data, national and provincial road data, municipal high resolution aerial photography and cadastre, electoral data and crime statistics to mention a few.
The notion that funding streams do not allow the opening of access to data is no longer viable. Custodian departments who charge for tax payer funded datasets need to ensure compliance with SDI. So to those with influence we implore you to “sumbandila” in access to data.
Contact Alex Fortescue, CSIR SAC, Tel 012 334-5004 , afort@csir.co.za