The Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development attended the first forum of the Monitoring for Environment and Security in Africa (MESA) held in Kenya from 31st August – 4th September 2015. The forum brought together industry experts from across Africa and provided a platform for stakeholders to showcase how Earth

Observation data through MESA Project supports policy, planning and decision making at the national, regional and continental level. The forum went on to show how MESA increases the information management, decision making and planning capacity of African continental, regional and national institutions mandated for environment, climate, food security and related responsibilities access to and exploitation of relevant Earth Observed applications in Africa.

In her opening statement, Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture of the African Union Commission, H.E. Tumusiime Rhoda Peace said: “This Forum is a great opportunity for all of us: African Decision-makers, Experts, Service Providers and the User Community to exchange views on various aspects of the project in order for the MESA project to remain relevant and useful to the community that it is intended to serve in its multiple sectoral areas of focus including agriculture, coastal and marine resources, climate variability and Climate change including assessment, natural resources conservation, disaster risks reduction, flood and drought monitoring, fisheries, forestry monitoring, land degradation mitigation, livestock management, monitoring of wildfires, and water resources management”. Read full story here

The Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development is implementing land degradation assessment, natural habitat conservation, and forest monitoring in the Intergovernmental Authority on Development region including Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Uganda, Eritrea, Burundi, and Rwanda through the MESA Project. MESA is a three-year project which started in 2014.