CIMMS researchers Race Clark and Zac Flamig traveled to Nairobi, Kenya from March 21-25 for meetings with the Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD), an organization supported by 20 member states in eastern and southern Africa. While in Nairobi, they trained RCMRD personnel on the use of EF5, a hydrological model that underlies the CIMMS/NSSL FLASH project. RCMRD’s goal is to promote sustainable development in their member states by using geo-information and associated technologies, products, and services to solve problems related to natural resources and environmental management. CIMMS’ involvement is coordinated through the SERVIR program, a program funded by NASA and USAID which uses RCMRD’s facilities as their East African “hub” or headquarters. SERVIR exists to help developing nations leverage remote sensing data from the United States in an effort to improve their environmental decision-making.
Between March 25 and April 1, Race and Zac are in Namibia conducting a similar training session with that country’s National Hydrological Services, part of a government ministry. This travel is funded by the University of Chicago’s Open Science Data Commons project, which is in turn funded by the National Science Foundation’s Partnerships for International Research and Education (PIRE) program. This is the sixth consecutive year that CIMMS personnel have traveled to Namibia to conduct hydrological model training.
You can learn more about past years’ activities, by visiting hydro.ou.edu and ef5.ou.edu.