MapAction provides information management and rapid mapping support for humanitarian responses to natural disasters, complex emergencies, and disaster preparedness. They have supported over 50 responses worldwide through activities like training, capacity building, deployments, and handovers using GIS tools like QGIS and ArcGIS. QGIS is promoted as it is free, easy to learn and use, supports internationalization and customization, works well with other tools and OSM, and produces high quality outputs. MapAction trainings focus on simple and effective map types, spreadsheet data integration, and practical exercises to build skills. Challenges include more advanced functions, data sharing, and time constraints.

1. MapAction and QGIS: GIS
for Humanitarian Response
Dartmoor National Park
QGIS UK SW User Group, 19 November 2015

2. What do we do
Provide information management/rapid mapping in:
Disaster Response
Natural disaster
Complex emergencies
Disaster Preparedness
NMDA
Intermediary organisations RC/RC Movement, WFP, OCHA
Capacity Building
Training missions UN/NGO
UNDAC & OSOCC training
International Disaster Simulation exercises

3. Slow Onset
SuddenOnset
Complex
;
p
9
A
D
H
K
⚞
I
$
L
Pakistan
Indonesia
Haiti
Nepal
Brazzaville
Sri Lanka
Japan
Indonesia
Suriname
Kenya
Ghana
Mexico
Benin
Burkina Faso
Bolivia
Namibia
El Salvador
Albania
Pakistan
Nicaragua
Paraguay
India
Sudan
Serbia
Paraguay
Malawi
Chile
Yemen
Jamaica
Dominican Republic
Myanmar
Haiti
Philippines
St Lucia
Philippines
Pakistan
Mediterranean
Cote d’Ivoire
Libya
Syria
CAR
Iraq
South Sudan
Cameroon
Sri Lanka
Lesotho
Niger
Sahel
Liberia
Sierra Leone
Mali
5
6Disaster
Response
á

4. Affected Population

5. Cash Transfer

6. Ebola Response Units

7. Facility Dashboard

8. Distribution and
Concentrations

9. Radio Station Coverage

10. Operations: Disaster Response

11. QGIS
Training
●
Capacity Building
●
Handover
●
Support
Deployments
●
ArcGIS is the default tool
●
QGIS as backup
●
QGIS as toolkit

12. 1: Training
Where
Zambia (govt)
Sri Lanka (World Bank)
Democratic Republic of
Congo (UNICEF)
Cameroon (UNICEF)
Mali (UN OCHA)
Sweden (MSB)
and others…
Who
Information Managers:
analytical maps
Humanitarian
workers: maps for to a
report
Other staff (eg Health
Workers): visualisation

13. Why QGIS?
It’s free, obviously…
It’s not hard to learn
It’s easy to internationalise/customise
It’s widely used in the humanitarian world
It has some important plugins (InaSafe)
It works well alongside other tools
It works well with OSM
It produces good quality outputs

14. What works best?
Simple choropleth maps and data-driven symbolisation
Spreadsheet data with lat/long coordinates
Overview and reference maps
OpenLayers base mapping
QGIS and GPS – practical exercises
Team/partner work
Show and tell
A mix of activities (demo, exercise, guided tasks)
and above all...
Keep it simple!

15. What's hard?
Print Composer
CRS
Labelling
Cartography
Marginalia
Planning
Data sharing and sensible storage
Time....
Suspicion of open source
Locked down desktops

17. 2: Deployment

19. www.mapaction.org
QGIS ‘Arrows’
1. Draw some
simple lines
2. Add your data
– or join to some
you already
made
3. Set your
parameters
4. Here's your shapefile of
data-driven arrows

23. www.mapaction.org
Excel Content on a QGIS Map
1. In Excel, set
up your data as
a named range
2. When your ranges are
set up, publish as Web
Page – and check
AutoRepublish
3. In QGIS, create
an HTML
Annotation and
point it at the web
page
4. Your QGIS
Annotations will
include the latest
version of the web
page

24. www.mapaction.org

25. www.mapaction.org
Offset Markers in QGIS
1. Add two (or
more) markers
2. Adjust
the offsets
3. Two markers,
one point

26. www.mapaction.org
ascott@mapaction.org
@antscott

27. Links
UN Portal: http://www.humanitiarianresponse.info
Humanitarian Data Portal: https://data.hdx.rwlabs.org/
Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team: https://hotosm.org/
MapAction: http://www.mapaction.org
UNCHR Portal:
http://data.unhcr.org/mediterranean/country.php?id=83
Intro to QGIS Workshop: http://antonys.github.io/qgis-
workshop/index.html