USAID Snapshot Template - Success Story

Rwanda’s National Disaster Early
Warning System
Mapping for Disaster Risk
Reduction.
SERVIR
NPDRR focal points who attended the
training in Kigali, Rwanda, together with
SERVIR-Eastern and Southern Africa
experts
"The Disaster Information
Portal/System we are codeveloping will help
MIDIMAR and other
stakeholders, both national
and international, access
hazard/disaster data in
Rwanda.”- Mr. Jean Baptiste
Nsengiyumva, the Director
for MIDIMAR’s DRR
department
For more information, please contact:
Dennis Macharia at
dmacharia@rcmrd.org
Across the globe, disasters and their impacts have been on the rise.
Developing countries like Rwanda are especially vulnerable to risks
from natural hazards such as floods, landslides, and drought. In
addition, such countries often lack historical data on hazards and
disasters because available data is scattered across sectors. This
kind of data would be useful in planning management of future
disasters. SERVIR-Eastern and Southern Africa (SERVIR-E&SA) is
helping Rwanda and other countries in the region leverage geospatial
technologies to reduce disaster risk and enhance regional capacity in
disaster management.
To determine the best approach, SERVIR-E&SA and MIDIMAR,
conducted a Regional Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) needs
assessment in Rwanda through interactions with end users -- mainly
government agencies and other supporting agencies such as NGOs
and UN/international institutions. The assessment highlighted the
need to use geospatial technologies for DRR, for meeting data access
needs, for strengthening institutions involved in disaster response and
management, and for enhancing technical capacity. It became clear
that a platform was needed to disseminate disaster risk profiles and
other hazard and disaster related information.
Such a portal is being co-developed by RCMRD and MIDIMAR.
Hosted by MIDIMAR, the portal serves as a coordination platform
facilitating data and information sharing with institutions and
individuals working in the DRR area and allowing disaster risk profiles
to be shared publicly. Further, this portal links national users to
historical and near real time climate datasets. Available information
includes the US Geological Survey Climate Hazard Group InfraRed
Precipitation with Station (CHIRPS) precipitation, MODIS forest fire
disaster impact trends from official sources in Rwanda, Global
Precipitation Measurement Mission (GPM) precipitation, and baseline
maps and hazard maps generated from analyses of Earth observation
datasets such as those from EO1. The portal also links national users
with early warning information such as that from USGS Drought Early
Warning Explorer.
The web portal also helps MIDIMAR access data from all other
institutions, and it will be a way of exchanging and accessing data on
hazards.