11-20, 09:25–09:30 (Pacific/Auckland), WG403
This talk showcases OSGeo Nepal’s journey as a new OSGeo local chapter, highlighting its grassroots growth, student-led initiatives, and collaborative projects. It demonstrates how a young, volunteer-driven community can make a meaningful impact through inclusive working groups, regular events, and partnerships with academic and professional organizations.
OSGeo Nepal officially became a local chapter of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGeo) in 2024. This lightning talk will highlight how even a young chapter can make a meaningful impact within a year through grassroots organizing, student engagement, and open collaboration.
OSGeo Nepal is structured into four active Discord-based working groups: Engineering, Data Access, Training & Knowledge Sharing, and Design & Communication. These groups are open spaces where members get to support a wide range of activities like helping each other solve problems, share useful resources, collaborate on tools and datasets, organise events, opportunity sharing, create training materials, and contribute to ongoing projects. It’s a place where beginners can learn from seniors, and seniors can mentor the new contributors in the open-source geospatial space. Regular meetups are held on the first Friday of every month, offering a welcoming space for connection, discussion, learning, and community updates. The chapter has also led community-driven events such as Coding Parties, GIS Day celebrations and Knowledge Sharing Sessions.
Throughout the year, OSGeo Nepal has supported and collaborated with student organizations such as GESAN, GES, and KUCC in events like the OSM Hackfest WRC-2024, Geospatial Meet, NEPGEOM-2024, WebGIS Training, IT Meet-2024, Geo-Talk and Map Design Competition. Chapter members have contributed as mentors, trainers, speakers, judges, and volunteers in such events. This lightning talk will also highlight the expansion of collaboration to professional bodies like NGES through programs like GeoSeries- an online platform that brings together experts and learners to explore applications of geospatial technologies. With student representatives from four institutes and a strong volunteer culture, OSGeo Nepal serves as a bridge between the national and global open geospatial communities. Anyone with a question or idea can drop it in the Discord and someone will always be ready to support.
Along the way, the chapter has encountered challenges common to emerging communities. Despite these challenges, the commitment of members has remained really strong. Looking ahead, OSGeo Nepal aims to reach more people from underrepresented communities, develop educational content in both English and local languages to improve accessibility, and strengthen collaboration with global OSGeo projects and contributors.
This talk aims to inspire new chapters, demonstrate the power of grassroots organizing, and focuses on how even a “baby chapter” can make a meaningful impact within a year.
I am a Geomatics Engineering graduate currently working as a Geospatial Analyst at Kathmandu Living Labs (KLL). I'm also a contributor to the OpenStreetMap community and a core volunteer in the OSGeo Nepal Chapter, where I support community-building efforts, communication design, and volunteering. With a strong passion for open-source geospatial technologies, I have participated in and contributed to various mapping, GIS, and remote sensing projects, including organizing and mentoring in events like OSM Hackfest, WebGIS Trainings, and map design competitions. I am also a graphic designer and motion design enthusiast, using my creative skills to make geospatial education and outreach more accessible. I am committed to promoting open data, open science, and community collaboration in the geospatial field.