FOSS4G 2022 general tracks

Overview on the Free & Open Source Software for geospatial in Togo (West Africa)
2022-08-26, 12:00–12:30 (Europe/Rome), Room 9

Open source software has grown rapidly in recent years in many developed countries. Developing states especially in low income states have also seen this development. The emergence of open source software, especially in the field of geographic information, has created practitioners and communities around these digital tools and commons. However, the freedom, free and easy access is seen by many technicians and decision-makers as less reliable and less efficient than proprietary software. In order to know the perceptions and the level of adoption of free software in Togo, we conducted a small survey among students, governmental and civil society actors and non professionnal cartographers. This presentation will help to highlight the importance of free software in Togo. Thus my presentation will clarify the types of projects in which open source geospatial is used, its interest for the users, in short, to have a clear idea on the state of the open source geospatial software in Togo.

M. Ata Franck AKOUETE is graduate in forestry science. He is a very active member of OSM Togo community. He is author of several scientific papers and led many free GIS capacity building courses in Togo. He launched and coordinated since 2018 GirlsMap initiative. He also led recently "discovery the world of openstreetmap" session at the Understanding Risk Conference of West and Central Africa which was held in Abidjan (Ivory Coast). He is promoting OpenData, Free GIS and open Geospatial Software in Togo by making consulting in international institutions like GIZ in Togo.